Bicentennial Original
by I.Magickal.Vivian
Summary: After enough people complained I decided to repost the original story, it won't be getting updates and exists to this day only because I need to cannibalize the original for the new version.
1. Chapter 1

Slateport was the home base of home bases, in a manner of speaking; a place to touch down in before leaving again into the wilds that had long since become more familiar than the city one was born in. Wander lust some people called it and of course "they always come back and stay where things were familiar", which was true to an extent. Mother lived here and not too far from the contest grounds, Devyn had always enjoyed the contests as all those in contest cities did so as the preliminaries rolled on for the Grand Festival she made her way to where the best of the best would be competing. The sheer convenience of Slateport holding the contest and not Ever Grande like last year meant that she had somewhere to stay even if it was just her old room. It provided a certain privacy that no Pokémon Center or Hotel could afford with thousands of fans packing the city from the Region and untold numbers from places far beyond the ocean.

She was staring at the screen lost and confused and disgusted to the core of her being with this thing and what it encompassed, disgusted by the rules that she'd had to follow since she was a child in school which involved not talking to anyone or using the bathroom in public. Disgusted by the complete and utter oddity that exuded from her like steam from the smoke stacks of ships that came into the harbor but Arceus damn her she couldn't let go to save her life because it felt too damn good. Tears of shame trickled down her cheeks as she fought against the crushing waves of nausea weighed against need, coupled with that intense inner hatred and longing that came when abstinence just became too much. The painful feelings and unknowingly cruel jokes that came from a strange time in which she had been ostracized by those around her, for both obvious and obscure reasons, battered at the surprisingly gentle psyche that had strengthened, into a substance harder than Steelix core metal Ice Breaking Barges that came into the harbor once a year in late fall on their way south, beneath the physical, moral, and spiritual training that had become part of an everyday routine.

The hateful words bore at her for years and as it was beginning to be too much everything in her world changed as rapidly as it had those years ago. The vivid memory of what had happened hit her with a force previously unknown and unimaginable in its intensity and it was almost painful to keep hold the skin there was so sensitive, the aching there so intense that it was almost enough to drive her completely insane but she was stronger now and therefore could withstand this punishment far longer than she could have before. No amount of previous training could slow the fire rapidly consuming everything within her at those images and no other images could stop them not even those from Saffron City, the sex capital of the world and the fact that her last visit to Kanto had revealed that some of the sick bastards that lived there actually used their Pokémon to… pleasure themselves… the very thought made the bile rise higher and for her to violently shake her head back and forth although she wasn't sure if that had more to do with the pleasure that was slowly but surely knotting the muscles of her abdomen and thighs or the repulsion but at this point it didn't matter.

She looked into that clear cerulean blue hazy and unfocused, an unbearable tightness around her and not even what she had endured beneath The Under could stave off her release, she was lost to the liquid fire pouring through her veins boiling until she had a captive sun beneath her skin as blistering as the nurseries that Deoxys was supposed to have been spawned from. She couldn't hold the fire inside anymore and it burst from that place low in her belly accompanied by a low sobbing cry of relief and shame and anguish and disgust mingled into one sorrowful sound was all she managed to articulate before the last of the cry was lost in wordless hollow pleasure, caught in the terrible satisfying waves she couldn't help herself as her body curled sideways and liquid warmth covered her left hand before her right. She felt the damn thing softening now, the aching granite hardness a thing of the past now between her fingers though she knew that it would wake her up later in the night or maybe two nights from now demanding attention and like the dutiful teenager with the snooze button she would comply. Sobbing into her sheets she curled further into a ball arms staying tucked against her stomach and the place where the damnable liquid still oozed against her lower belly, closing her eyes she would content herself to spending the night alone and bleaching the sheets tomorrow.

Those dreams were filled with bitter hatred at those who were cruel to her, the lingering excitement and fear of her ordeal in The Under, and that which broke her spirit at Meteor Falls.

-ooo-

Heavy duty industrial drier whip were a godsend as in water hot enough to scold skin took care of both the sheets from her bed and all the white clothes that she had not had the opportunity to wash on her way back from the Northern Sands. That was one of the benefits of having a mother that dyed silk and other high quality materials rich and vibrant colors, you could hide your sheets with your clothes and not suffer the embarrassment of two washes, the washing machine in the house was one of the best although it wasn't used primarily for washing and the drier was coated with a non-stick surface that was hosed out after every use. Her mother had come up with a brilliant two step system that involved heating the material to a temperature just below its flash point and adding in finely crushed brilliantly colored ore she got from her husband, who was a miner up at Meteor Falls for the winter months and a fisherman in the warmer spring and summer months. When she was done with the grinding process all you had left was a substance with the feel of powdered sugar, added into the water it made a hot syrup like brew that was washed three times and dried twice, once on a rack in the sun or under the UV Bulbs in a room in the basement and once in the drier, to create some of the more vividly colored textiles on this side of the world. Put bleach or additional colors in it with white sheets and not only do you get some serious tie dye swirls but you get the cleanest sheets this side of the factory that makes them.

She pulled the black cap further down over her ears and closes the door to the living room sized laundry room stepping into the very sunny kitchen, the weather seemed to work in adverse here it never really rained here in Slateport unless there was a storm coming in. The moisture ran up north and slammed Fortree day in and day out to the point where you almost never got a dry day here it would rain maybe once a day but it would be cloudless and stop shortly after beginning, like Lilycove during the summer months. Here though, in early spring it was perfect weather to head to Slateport with the multitude of businesses that actual hand crafted their arts were setting up to dispose of the surplus created during the frigid winter months here.

The brilliant sunny yellow theme room somehow managed to cheer her spirits more than the fact that this early in the morning this time of year her father was northwest mining his ass off which was a good thing; she didn't think she could handle him and his comments. He would be home later this week but by then this would be just a bad memory and not something as recent as it was now. She knew without searching that her mother was undoubtedly in the 'Sun Room' which was a converted porch/living room/atrium that was attached to the street side of their house just off the central market place setting up her wears and talking to potential customers and previous clients come to pick up orders. Leaning her lithe form against the cheery counters inlaid with hand painted designs of leaves and some flowers actually pressed beneath the thin sheet of glass that covered the granite countertops she stared out the wide window into the alley way and tried not to think about her shame which, as she predicted earlier, had woken her up in the wee hours of the morning, when the sky was grey and the horizon line was a pale lime, demanding her attention. Obediently she had palmed the throbbing thing and recalled her last adventure to Orre and the things she had endured willingly and eagerly to be accepted into a tribe that was feared, hated, terribly misunderstood.

Barefoot she turned to her left and opened the icebox door searching for the coffee grounds that her mother kept in the freezer for freshness, it worked and made the woman happy who was she to complain? It wasn't the only weird quirk the family had by far and that wasn't going to far as to mention the defect she, her aunt, and three of her cousins shared. You just had to go with it and make the best out of life as you could, the identity crisis of teenaged years took on a whole new meaning but the five of them identified and responded to both the female and male pronouns. Winter moss green eyes flicked upwards in response to the weight that chose that moment to situate itself on her head and rub her ears affectionately. The heat of those little hands were too warm for the season but it was comforting and the little nipper had been sitting on top of the box waiting for her to open it and lean that 6'1 frame over to peer inside and jump upon.

He nipped at the top of her cap and received a playful swat high on his flank for it, an acknowledgement that while they didn't play last night they would later today but not now. Obediently he moved to cling to the plain white t-shirt lay his head on her shoulder, the affectionate little monkey just wanted attention from his mommy and she'd give him that because he did deserve it. Setting the grounds into the filter and filling the pot with water she proceeded to turn on the stove and pull out the eggs, and pancake mix from the fridge checking the dates although she knew that she didn't have to, it was another one of those things that her mother was spastic about.

She set him to work climbing to the higher cabinets set around the windows to get down a large mixing bowl, a small skillet, the non-stick spray to grease the skillets and cookie sheet with. The eyes were blazing heat by the time she expertly cracked four eggs onto the black surface and poured the first perfectly circular pancake into the other. Turning she saw the cinnamon furred monkey sitting on the table carefully laying out pre-cut cookies on the sheet pre-sprayed, he worked with diligent fingers that held an agile flexibility that she admired and envied on some level. Already as a baby he was showing promise and talent, his enormous ears twitched and fluttered with the flow of voices coming from the door that led to the 'gallery' where they could both hear the voices of customers and the soft spoken lilt of her mother. Strange and somehow right to hear it again after so long away from home, dismissing that thought she got back to work.

Busy work like this didn't bother her, not when she moved the first three sheets of cookies into the oven to bake and fed the little nipper bits and pieces of pancake. Earlier, when she'd first woken up and showered with the rising of the sun, she'd gone out back to feed the other inhabitants of the house who had greeted her graciously. It wasn't that there were favorites played amongst the nonhuman inhabitants of the peaceful converted inn, they weren't really required to stay indoors or outside, the choice rested entirely with them but the scent of the sea salt and sweetness of the florists that lived nearby was a potent thing that when coupled with the lullaby of the waves against the beach and temperate climate that never rose to terrible far over seventy-five during the day and never dropped beneath a cool seventy who wouldn't want to sleep outside?

The oven dinged roughly the same time as she finished washing the skillets and setting the pancakes and eggs onto the table with two places set by the little nipper, who now set with his flaming little tail wagging furiously eating a pancake the size of his considerably small head. Devyn grabbed two tea towels and pulled each of the sheets out to cool enough to be put onto the serving platter and taken into the other room for the pleasure of the guests and neighborhood children who knew that Mrs. Alexandria gave out cookies to anyone who wanted them and who was polite in asking.

Smiling at the thought of seeing kids she hadn't seen in a season and maybe some of the new contestants in the competition coming up she fed herself and the little nipper a generous portion of eggs and pancakes before washing the plate and placing it on the drying rack. Making quick work of the steps to the second floor at the far end of the kitchen by the back door she made a quick left into her room ignoring the bare bed, she pulled on one of the 'work shirts' she owned with the family name on the back and her own in a black oval on her left breast over the plain white one and pulled on an apron that contained some simple art supplies like charcoal pencils, a thin flexible wire, appointment cards, pens, and a rainbow of thin fine point color markers.

Back downstairs she checked the button on her hat also advertising the family name and name of the business, scraped the still hot but now edible cookies onto a platter which she carefully picked up and backed through the doubled hinged doors to the 'Gallery' and work to relieve her mother for breakfast and entertain the masses.

-ooo-

Slateport during the time of the Grand Festival was a time of great unrest and unease which seemed a stark contrast to the general hoopla and festivities that raged all throughout the port town, it was spring and having been release from the bitter winters here frozen by the chilly wind from Pacificlog carried by the west jet stream it seemed like even the spirits of the natives were thawed and had come out to play. The place could rival Jubilife City during the right time of year although she had to admit being "that kid from Sinnoh" seemed to be weighing against her although much to her chagrin the blonde seemed in complete and total control of the situation and at ease with the vernacular and habits and products that the city now seemed to be bursting with.

Trying not the shrink in on herself Dawn tried to decipher some of the authentic Slateportian cuisine which seemed to range from seaweed wrapped rice to a kind of fruit filled tarts and other sweets and everything in between. Trying not to feel too dejected the sixteen year old let her twenty-four year old lover ease her through a region she obviously was very familiar with through the restaurant districts to the gambling advertised Slateport. She was sure that at night the board walk must've been lit up like Jubilife during the New Year's celebrations with the number of hotels and adventure planning sites, tourist traps of all shapes and sizes.

Though she was sure that Cynthia had said something about going to the only place she would ever stay when she came through by port or land, somehow she got suckered into staying for longer periods of time on each visit. Apparently Devyn lived here, while she had personally never met Devyn the common assumption was that whoever it was was a member of Blue Archeology, which most of Cynthia's friends were so, here she was being led away from the flashing lights and ringing music of one armed bandits and a plethora of other machines to wasting your money in towards the thriving shopping districts making it a point to avoid the main street leading down to the pier. This seemed like a strange thing to do when you considered that most of the hotels were further back away from the pier giving the local markets their traditional place in the city. Most of the residential areas were set startlingly close to the water which seemed like a stupid thing to do and she would've voiced that but then she saw where they were headed. Her eyes widened in shock, impossibly shiny and impossibly blue.

"You said that you still weren't sure what look you were going to go with for the contest right?" the hand in hers tightened its grip and it was reassuring to the marrow of her bones, no she wasn't sure and being so far from home didn't help with that feeling although she was sure that her lover being originally from Unova of all places knew what the feeling was like. Nodding silently she kept her eyes fixated on the strange building bustling inside cheerfully with a sign outside covered in loudly painted art proclaiming that it was 'Alexandria's' with no further explanation of why the notice boards outside were covered in childlike drawings and inscriptions, nor why the porch that she guessed had come into this world white was also covered in brightly colored splotches matching the whole front of the house including the door. "This is the place to be and you'll get a jump on the rest of the competition especially those who haven't secured a place in the next rounds next week."

That her blonde haired stormy eyed companion was right about, in the last competition she had secured her place in the Grand Festival here in Hoenn snagging one of the last spaces open prior to the close out of the Bicentennial Grand Festival, five ribbons wouldn't cut it here it was all about skill and precision and she'd managed it by the skin on her teeth, securing the reserved spots was the difficult part that would rank you up high enough to see some appeals before it came your turn to strut yourself in front of the best literally in the world. She'd been on full panic mode; if you won a Bicentennial you had bragging rights **_literally_** for the next fifty years, and Cynthia had brought her here of all places. This place was legendary, her mother had paid an unreal amount of money for a dress that she had worn for the most spectacular victory over her rivals at her last contest.

She wasn't normally one to judge a book by its cover by the cover was looking pretty unappealing, especially considering the sheer famousness of the place, though as she watched several smartly dressed businessmen walked out onto the porch smiling and waving at someone back inside the screen door. Tripping over herself and some school children running to cluster around a teenager who'd walked out shortly after the businessmen carrying an enormous tray and pulling a cart of paint, nothing too spectacular about the teen except maybe the tiny silver handprint on his cheek left by a Pokémon, or so Dawn guessed baby's didn't have such finely formed control of their hands to do that, tall and lanky she guessed high fives maybe 5'9 5'10 5'11 maybe 6'0 possibly 6'1, unremarkable dark brunette hair either cut short or kept under wraps by a black baseball cap with more silver handprints on it, maybe it could contain other shades and blends to it but the sun was blocked from the porch by the awning.

She felt the elation of the, am standing next to her come in through her hand, an old friend and a Slateportian? Was this Devyn? As Dawn's thought raced she depended almost solely on her lover to keep her on her feet in the slowly thickening market crowd and didn't notice that she was standing on the porch meeting that person and the Chimchar of her shoulder both of them smiling. Up close she realized how either tall this new person was or just how short she was, Cynthia had already towered over her at 5'8 but the other girl had four inches easy on the twenty four year old.

She watched as her lover threw arms around the boy's neck and he embraced her, lifting her easily off of her feet and popping her back with the fierceness and the swing of the bear hug she'd been caught in. He pressed a familiar, almost familial, kiss on her forehead and Dawn felt a bond that was more intimate than friend and borderline on siblings. Setting her down he looked at her and grinned a lopsided thing that made her smile back. The man was absolutely infectious, and he had dimples… deep ones.

-ooo-

Seeing Cynthia was an expected and much anticipated surprise, the blonde seemed to light up when she half pulled the young teen she was walking with up the stairs and all but attacked her for the hug. Her rock in a hard place in her life she had saved Cynthia at the age of fourteen and ever since the two year gap that should have seen them in two very different social castes, dependent on the year they turned ten, had not meant anything. This was the sister that she never had, the first person that she had met later in life that honestly did not care about her defect and called her friend anyway. A refreshing thing to experience.

Turning her attention down to the awestruck girl she offered a hand. "Hello, I'm –" the rest of the words died in her throat as the prickling along the back of her neck told her that she was being watched. As a blooded member of Blue Archeology the instinct of danger and wrongness had been what had saved her life too many times over to count as soon as the sensation set in her eyes snapped up searching for the source of the disturbance. And that was when her day when from bad to worse.

Devyn felt her body harden to the point where she was sure that in its haste the skin had split like a crushed melon, like she hadn't attended to that shameful need the night before; her eyes met those unmistakable cerulean depts. She had seen those eyes dark with need, pale with concern and pain, and sparkling with admiration and gratitude too many times over their short relationship to not know them when she saw them.

"S _olidad…_ "she wasn't sure if she said it out loud or if she just thought it and didn't have time to spring over the railing and chase her down like she had in the past because the blonde's fingers came up to snap in front of her face and the two shared a brief conspiratorial look sharing more in that fraction of a second than she could with words shaking her head to bring her back onto track. Legs aching to move, body fiercely demanding that she chase down her mate in an imitation of the traditional mating habits of the untold millions of Mightyena and Absol all across the Independent Nation of Hoenn. It was a good thing to because she didn't know if she could reasonable talk about her brief and intense three weeks with Solidad or if they would go at it like the animal that Devyn would have chased her down as. Silently cursing and thanking Cynthia she composed herself and swallowing she continued.

-ooo-

"-Alexandria, folks around here and Cynthia call me Devyn." That voice was a low husky base with the subtle undertones that held a singing quality, deep but not effeminate, purring kind of lilt to it that seemed to be the general accent of all of Hoenn but unique enough to make it Slateportian. Strange. It was strange but not exactly unattractive because he was a very attractive man. He seemed to have lost a step because he has skipped over his name though she guessed that Devyn was shorthand for something long, something that she would get tongue tied shouting in pleasure because if that thing in his pants was any indication of his ability with it then he was more than enough for her. Dimly she wondered what drew that sort of reaction from him, her eyes had not caught what his had but then she had been too busy examining him which was the only reason she had seen because he had shifted his stance hiding his problem from view with a subtle illusion.

"Nice to meet you, Devyn." She offered a hand to the man politely, eyes now drawn away from this hidden friend because it was no longer her eye candy. It made her wonder though, his voice… the subtle mannerisms… a question arouse but not one that she could ask and expect an answer, she would have to puzzle him out with her detective skills and cover it was another not so subtle question.

"My dear friend told me that you're in need of a look to make you shine for the Bicentennial." Shooing the children around them he made his way to the front door, beckoning them inside.

"Okay so what's the skin tone that we're working with here? From there can we reach out select the colors that'll best compliment your appeal and then accents to back light your Pokémon and your seals?" Confusion burned in her mind though what she was hearing made sense even as they were made to take off their shoes before entering the traditionally run house, beckoned up a set of rose wood stairs to the second floor where bolts of multiple colored fabric sat on displays waiting for be browsed, while several people walked the open floor that had obviously been taken out, walls broken down and expanded upon to create a bigger space.

"Cynthia, I zoned out while Devyn was talking and now I'm confused, is Devyn a b-" she was cut off so abruptly with a kiss that it made her dizzy, that was a question that you didn't ask and information she couldn't glean from Cynthia easily, more questions surrounding her lover, like asking anything that had anything to do with the actual work of Blue Archeology. She was losing her touch steadily after she let that man catch her snooping around, since she hadn't been asked back for another adventure with the blonde and their group. "Our Devyn is special." She breathed intimately against the dark haired girl's lips, "Don't bring it up."

-ooo-

Devyn pretended not to hear as she made her way to the only door facing the open gallery upstairs, she had no doubt that the blonde knew where to go and what had happened. She slipped through the fitting rooms to the back door that held the templates for different dress designs taking a seat behind one of the high tables in a low chair quickly unfastening her belt and reaching down to rearrange herself inside to fit against the inseam of her leg. With the natural curvature to the left she had very little choice as to where it would fit but the sensation of her fingers just moving it through her boxers was more than enough to make her whimper.

Composing herself she took in the silent treatment she had received from Dawn, she knew where the girl's eyes were drawn to and despite the question smelled a rat in the air. Maybe the others was right about her but she doubted it, Dawn was not smart enough for something like that and being smart was what would insure her survival Cynthia's lover or not. Her mind raced as she recalled every last detail about what would happen if they let the Dragon Master do as she would, Dawn wouldn't last three minutes locked in a room with that demon. A sound drew the nipper down to the table and she looked up to find Cynthia come into the room and felt the damn thing harden again, how messed up did she have to be to enjoy the thought of what the demon would do to Dawn? Well… she had spent time in The Under doing things that people would consider immoral and would petition to make illegal. Okay so maybe she wasn't normal for more reasons than the raging, pulsating thing against her left thigh, exhaling slowly she pulled the catalogues up onto the table and gestured for them to sit.

It was going to be a long day.

-ooo-

She could've never made the mistake when she felt that connection across the street, the electric connection that coiled in her belly like a storm on the sea, it struck lower like lightning touching the earth and set off a whirlwind of sensation in her womb. She ducked around the corner into one of those corridor alley ways that housed all sorts of interesting shops and stores, heart racing she couldn't believe what she had seen though she wasn't sure why she couldn't believe it. Her heart hammered in her chest as she was taken back to a place that she had enjoyed greatly, on the way to Rustboro City she had gone out for a jog one early morning. The mist had covered the ground thickly at knee height and she hadn't heard the boots that came swiftly after her, the whisper of something on the damp leaf strewn ground was the only thing that hinted at something chasing her. Hands secured around her waist and dragged her to the ground; a laughing man had her on top of him and kissing him senseless in her fright within seconds.

It was unbelievable that she hadn't thought that she would see them again here of all places, while hell had broken lose over the ocean she had done nothing but talk to him and he had told her that he lived in Slateport and was an avid fan of contests although he made a lousy coordinator himself. _"My first try ended horribly, I decided to just try my luck as a Guardsmen instead. Within a week of training my Feebas evolved into a Milotic. I haven't the heart to try again, if she decided to evolve doing something else then our collective heart just isn't in for competitions."_ The story had had her laughing into their fourteenth hour of being trapped.

Heart racing she ran, fleeing like a wild and primal thing through the woods. Being blinded by the wind and the frantic motions of her hair mirroring her heart and mind had little to do with her erratic rush, she was moving now like one did when being chased through dense underbrush and trees, relying more on that animal tingling in the back of her neck than any external sense.

Arceus, she remembered sharing that small limestone cave on Route 115 during "The Storm of the Decade", swept their by fate or a lahar if you didn't believe in such a thing. Being trapped on that shelf for four days she'd learned a lot more about Devyn Alexandria more than she intended. They had become intimately close and he was exceptionally good with children but something had drawn him away and it hadn't been another woman. He had gotten into a fight with another man, a violent fight that had ended with him throwing the man out of a window and the very next day he had broken up with her privately and left Verdanturf Town in an explosively public argument that he had staged with her over breakfast. He had said that it was safer that way and remembering the fight she couldn't help but agree with him.

She remembered the feel of Devyn beneath her, elegant hands gripping her waist pulling her closer and closer, driving deeper and deeper, the sensation of her nails in a strong back and the taste of salt on her lips from those tears as she eased the ache there for her sweet, sweet Valentyne. Took away that shame and when it was over disappeared, the secret she'd taken from there. She ran blindly and somehow came back to the hotel she was staying in, back into the room, shaking legs failing beneath her she sank to the floor. The last time she'd seen Devyn had been three years ago and now barely out of his teens she saw that boy again but those eyes… those green eyes misted with a silver grey… shuddering she hugged herself and wished that she could just will those arms around her again.


	2. Chapter 2

Listening to Dawn she mentally came to this consensus: she thought of little else externally but her appeals which made her a good Coordinator if not a horrible conversationalist. It was interesting and exhilarating talking to someone who was so passionate about what they did, the teenager was distracting which proved to be a godsend for the twenty two year old focusing on those words was more than enough to keep her from thinking about Solidad and their relationship. "Okay, so because you're going into the first round with the intention of using ice and water type appeals I'm thinking something delicate that won't contrast too much with the decorations whatever they may be." She knew exactly what the decorations were going to be for each round and each day but that was confidential information that was not to be shared.

Turning around the rough sketch of the dress she showed the color scheme to the black haired girl. "We should go with a pale, almost white color for the dress something like Alice Blue, with a ribbon matching waist ribbon and garnish the whole thing with sapphire, cerulean and Carolina. The overall theme will work with your intended appeal and be pleasing to the eye." The professional feedback and explanations seemed to come as a shock to Dawn and blocked Cynthia from asking questions she already knew the answer too but it was only so long before they got into the uncomfortable conversation that was brewing between them with ammunition on both sides.

Reaching into the bin of plastic tabs beneath the counter she pulled out a card that had a number and letter combination on it and explained the organization of the internal show room. "So now we go to the closet of wonders, explore the madness, select a style, do some hemming and pinning here and there, mark the alterations on a blank dress and get to work. Look in the section marked with the Q, racks 100 to 130." Gesturing towards one of the arches that lead into the "closet of wonders" she let the fashion conscious younger girl go skipping gleefully into the dress room, it wasn't a fast move and it wasn't a jaunty walk the girl literally skipped over in a high hip swaying motion giddy with the prospect of putting on dresses. "Well, that's a first."

"It was Solidad wasn't it." It wasn't a question; it was a statement that instantly made her defensive even as it made her want to crawl into a hole and die. Hiding things from Cynthia was like trying to fit a Mamoswine into the icebox, just wasn't going to work, although the smart ass side of her did whisper that if you put it into a pokeball it would fit just fine. "Don't hide from me. Spill it or I'll find your favorite pair of boxers, you know the lucky ones with the Huntails and doubloons on them and torch them, Dev." And she would too.

That nickname again…

She tightened her jaw and stoically looked the blonde in the eyes, she'd have a hard time finding them because she'd lost them in The Under six months ago… it was more likely that Spark had kept them but that was the past and this was the present. They really were lucky boxers. She seemed to remember that little adventure as well because the tips of her ears went pink and she revised her threat.

"Tell me or so help me I'll tell the world who you really are, do you want to get swamped by fans?" and that did it, she actually winced at that, while everyone pretty much knew who Cynthia was on sight because of her status as Champion and her high regard in the world of archeology seeing the enigmatic Devyn somewhere and recognizing _him_ was very unlikely. During the winter months she normally travelled somewhere, usually mountains or passes or particularly hard to find locations that yielded either: fascinating Pokémon, places, people, foods, or views. Every season a block ran in a popular travel magazine that was a recollection of the previous season's journeys usually accompanied by pictures or something of the sort, a traveler's almanac so to speak. In the winter Devyn took high altitude to a whole new extreme and gave a new perspective on places to visit even if it was dangerous, the world was a beautiful place and you never really appreciate life unless your life is in danger. The slightly masochistic side of Devyn had attracted quite a following though not as strong as Cynthia's or even Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock of the Dragon Masters or even Jayr on the Dark Side with who people watched in television just for the hell of it.

Though rightfully Cynthia was Champion before she was a traveler, her entries were read by her longtime fans as well as new ones because her name attracted attention from the media even in districts and nations far from her homeland of Unova. Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock of the Dragon Masters was well known and well read by the fanatics that had followed the utter desolation and despair that she had wrought upon every organized league both official and not across the world, the only one to hold the World Champion title, people took advice from the quiet demon quite seriously. Jayr of the Dark Side was famous because she had become the figure head for Those of the Void, the public image of the world's most hated ethnicity, as they gained redemption from years of violence with the psychics.

No one really knew Devyn for any other reason than the articles she wrote; no one knew that _his_ last name was Alexandria.

While she would bring more customers to the converted inn most would only stay to get a glimpse and ask stupid questions like why _he_ only had four companions in _his_ travels… well five now but she didn't count the little nipper, he wasn't really hers in the eyes of the law she'd just "friended" him after finding the egg a season ago near Olivine City in Johto, of all places, she suspected that another trainer had abandoned him after he failed to hatch in a timely manner.

That was not something that anyone wanted, that the magazine had taken her request seriously when she'd asked to never be photographed and put into an issue, it was a common request though normally by those with more wealth of fame than wealth of knowledge. It was not an empty threat and if anyone would do such a thing it would be Sea Touched Cynthia. "The next time you're sick with fever from the sea your ass is dead or in the hospital, I'll tell you some now but details later… definitely later." The words were a low growling base that she realized was far more threatening than she had thought a year ago.

This was going to take booze, beer, a bar, possibly a whole pack of cigarettes, and a slow screw against a wall, few shots of pure alcohol, and more than a little prodding in the right direction as well as maybe a round of kickboxing and a baseball bat. She could tell this wasn't going to be something as easily yielded as what was purchased for Christmas, all it usually took was for her to sit in Devyn's lap and look up at her with a sad expression on her face. Just as Devyn began to feel the pressure between them she was saved by the bubbly Coordinator.

She came that skipping out of the back room holding up a blank slip with a bow on the back and a delicate crisscross of four individual pieces of fabric creating a halter affect around the neck. Cynthia was fixated on her legs as she began to remove her shoes to try it on for the inevitable alterations, Devyn had zoned out looking at the natural etchings in the hardwood caused by the cutting the wood down to size from trees.

"Do you remember when I went to Meteor Falls and that storm broke over the ocean?" she didn't wait for an answer as she gestured for Dawn to stand on one of the four boxes in the corner of the room surrounded by a panoramic of mirrors. Hands busy pushing multi-colored pins into the dress, moving and shifting around fabric to get the desired effect on such a slender, relatively plain body. "The western face of the mountain took the brunt of it, as you well know, but what got me stuck was the camp fire I saw the nights before the storm broke. They were moving further up the mountain instead of down so I tracked the person and we ended up in a mudslide that took us to that shelf and cave on."

Devyn knew that Cynthia knew exactly what she was talking about; she'd spent many a year on Meteor Falls training with the Dragon Master Clan at the base to put a better edge in her game and develop a closer bond with her partners. The shelf she was familiar with because her master had made her climb it once a week and later once a day, she'd raved about it for months, talked about the limestone cavern there that seemed to be seven times hotter than the outside because of the volcanic core of the Falls.

"I think the fall knocked me cold for a while but there was this woman there, I think she dragged me inside because there was no way that I fell directly into the cavern, simply impossible. She looked so small and so vulnerable but she was faintly sea touched and she got sick relatively fast." The brunette gave no direct references to anything besides the storm that had rocked the Hoenn Region for a week before it lost its power on land just ten miles outside of Lilycove and died down into nothingness. The cold water off the coast would've fueled it and it would've just gotten worse from there, tearing apart everything in its wake. It had been on International News and broadcasted worldwide for months after as "Hoenn Recovered".

The sound of the girl's voice tore through her awareness and hinted at more of Dawn's personality, making it a point to start visibly to keep up appearances both of the older women stared at her like she'd just entered the room. Quite intentionally on Devyn's part but she suspected that Cynthia just hadn't cared enough to remember that her girlfriend was in the room. "What does that mean, sea touched?"

"Sea-touched is one of those words that only natives and those who understand Slateportian and Lilycove Speech really understand. Popular vernacular for a fever that is caused when exposed to certain agents in sea water, when someone is particularly vulnerable to it and succumbs to it easily they are 'sea touched' because it's just easier to say. Besides you must understand in a city that was founded by fishermen there are a lot of words that you landlocked fools don't know. Doesn't happen to the locals after maybe nine or ten." Devyn added the last with a biting, teasing tone, a low blow, a jab at Cynthia who returned in kind.

"That's because you're so used to inhaling sea salt and being drenched by sea spray that not even chloroform works on you guys." The older women laughed at that leaving the younger baffled by the casualness with which they addressed one another, how anyone could be so callous with the _Champion_ of another region was stunning. Regardless of previous encounters she had been uncomfortable addressing her girlfriend as just that for months but this Devyn was at ease with the whole situation, and if she was right then the expression on the younger's face of horrified admiration was just good acting.

Her mind churned and she looked at them flabbergasted, "What?" hopelessly lost and clearly not faking her confusion Devyn laughed a low, soft sound.

"A combination of sea salt, sea spray, and the sun is enough to drain the energy, the vitality right out of you if you're not careful. Like chlorine in a pool. We're so used to the combination of all those three things that not very much works in terms of putting us to sleep except maybe Jigglypuffs." The smile on the brunette's face lit up those features and Dawn, who was confused about the common speech of Slateport.

-ooo-

"Okay, spill." The single most annoying person in the world was sitting next to her right now, no not Ask Ketchum although he ranked a close second but, if anyone has ever seen the regional Queen of Sinnoh, a well-respected archeologist drunk then you've officially met the one person you did not what to have to deal with. Repetitive conversations were at the top of her list of things to avoid at all costs and since alcohol is a truth serum and the truth was that her friend was boisterous and insecure you saw both sides of the legendary champion of Sinnoh. "Okay spill." She spun around on the bar stool smiling broadly at no one in particular about two and a half sheets to the wind.

The brunette looked down at the fourteen shot glasses in front of them, all of them had been Slate Wine which wasn't really wine but appallingly strong vodka brewed up north in Fallarbor Town for the Mid-Summer Festival, she wanted to call for another few rounds but not being able to walk home was not a good tradeoff for the ease of words. "Okay, okay! But you have to tell me why you called me crying four months ago." Devyn snapped harsher than intended, the native tapped three fingers on the bar top the forefinger and ring finger sitting behind the middle extended further than the others. Two ales, a thick brew that was native to the city and made by the owner Mick anyway… it sort of hurt to down but it was affective and delicious. "Now then… remember Meteor Falls for my segment right?"

"Yeah I remember because it was me, you and Erin most of the way North, then Erin broke off in Mauville with Jayr and I let Charlie cajole me into yet another adventure in sand land." Cynthia shuddered at the memory of the indestructible girl, Arceus must have blessed her or adored her because no way in any twisted man's mind did anyone have that much luck, she had more than her fair share of adventures with though despite the fact that Charlie Lyhnnmann was notoriously danger prone it was very true that most of the major archeological discoveries made in the past ten years were unearthed by the surly girl. In the past Devyn had gone so far as the tell her that she was tempting fate but the good humored laugh she received by way of response seemed to display her views of the world and everything within it.

Charlie was good people though, the girl's ability to charm death seemed to be the direct result of her spending an entire childhood with two well-known archeologists, tombs and other such ruins seemed to draw her like a moth to flame. The two of them had met Charlie completely by mistake one day when the seventeen year old, at the time, had slammed face first into the twenty year old Cynthia and toppled her back over and through a dense patch of grass concealing the hiding place of Registeel three days outside of Lilycove. They had become fast friends and between the three of them had pieced together more information about the ancient world then many of the more prominent and older professors across the world.

"If I remember correctly, you ran into the storm on the west coast and toppled down the side of Meteor Falls to a secluded section of the route that very few people know about or try to get to in early spring. What in the world compelled you to go that way back into civilization? Rusboro is a week from the Falls while even the Dragon Master encampment is only a day." Cynthia slurred slowly, articulating every word like drunken people did when they didn't want to sound drunk but only highlighted the amount of alcohol they consumed. She was starting out slow and not asking the question that she really want answered, what had ended the relationship that they had shared.

"I spent the whole winter in the mountains, that might have had something to do with it but I caught sight of camp fires leading to higher altitudes. I guessed that whoever it was had no idea that mountains give the term 'Flash flood' a whole new definition." Devyn chuckled softly, "Anyway, I had Absol help me keep tabs on them as I made my way back up the eastern face after the fool, for a week I stayed behind her but I did save time taking more difficult trails upwards, I swear to you I have never since or before climbed up more feet of sheer ninety degrees angles."

-ooo-

-Three Years Ago-

 _The highest altitude on the Connectivity of Hoenn was bitterly cold even in early spring; the snow had begun to fall heavily in driving sticky sheets for what she felt would be the last time in the season, obscuring the landscape to all those who were unsure, untrained, and inexperienced as the terrain was a treacherous beast waiting to snag ankles and take out many a hiker for a few seasons if not forever. The leg shattering holes that potmarked the area would take a full grown man down to his him and swallow a small child at their shallowest, some of the holes opened into the caverns below and a fall like that would kill anyone unfortunate enough to step on the wrong patch of grass. She paused to inspect the landscape carefully as she moved off one of the marked Diamond trails that were constantly checked over for their stability and safety and looked back down mountain to see if her shadow was still there._

 _He was._

 _The man made an impressive sight from a distance, he knew what he was doing picking quickly and easily over the snow with an ease and grace that belied human motion even though he was a good thousand or so feet below. From her current position she could tell that he was well versed because he did not make the same clumsy mistakes she did and took routes she though that were impossible. It was beautiful to watch though she was well aware that he was following a path chosen with meticulous and almost obsessive compulsive care by an enormous white creature with a grey scythe on its head. Someone who trusted their luck to a creature known as 'The Disaster Pokémon' at this time of year, when the ice was melting and accidents were up, had a level of confidence in his partner that anyone else would have thought was foolish arrogance._

 _The man moved up the side of the mountain with a single minded determination that defied belief making much better time than she had, at the time it didn't occur to her that as the storm clouds gathered at sea he was rushing faster and faster up to her, the clouds themselves were not heading into shore by her reckoning and the winds hadn't shifted in days._

 _She brought her binoculars up to her face scrolling the zoom in to make out his face and smiled he was handsome and moved like a Delcatty raised by contest professionals; she pushed herself to her feet and tucked the goggles back in place, enough resting to adjust to the lower oxygen. She had a new respect for Dragon Masters that called this place home their lung capacity must be astronomical. Brushing her hands on her jeans she took ahold of the walking stick she'd carved for herself, with more than enough prototypes to speak of her almost non-existent whittling skill, and set on further up the marked path. Absently she noted the scent of the sea in the air._

-ooo-

"Time wasn't on my side, Cynthia. I didn't catch up with her until the next afternoon at the summit just as the storm reached land and unleashed its fury. Only luck brought the flood down in a spiral and she literally crashed into me with a torrent of water. Took my legs clean out beneath me and I belly flopped half on top of her and when I tell you that it was the coldest water I've ever been in I am not exaggerating." She shuddered next to her longtime friend who gave her a sobering expression.

"Even the water from the Shoal cave that one time we weren't paying attention to the tide had nothing on this." The seriousness in his voice was disguising the unspoken comment, their expedition to the Shoal Cave had left both Devyn and Sundown in a state of utter agony. It had been so unbelievably cold that it took their breath away at the same time caused their balls to literally retreat within their bodies so fast that when they'd tried to cry out they got a mouthful of frigid water cold enough to crack the fillings in Charlie's teeth and cause ice crystals to form on the poor girl's glasses within moments.

The cold had been instantaneous and bone deep, the sensation was a sharp stabbing pain and there had been an honest risk of hypothermia, caught in the cave overnight they'd collected some driftwood and started a bonfire with four flares that burned so hot that their skin turned a nice rosy shade of pink as they huddled naked together like small children. Unforgiving and punishing were the words that came from mind as they sat together that night sharing far more than the wanted to with the exception of Jayr and Sundown who spend half the night trying to convince Devyn to get a piercing somewhere, and that had been in summer. Something like that coupled with the snow and ice on the summit of a mountain in a rush of water that more than a few hikers drowned in every year was an experience that Cynthia could not even begin to fathom.

"Worse than that Cynthia, four times worse because it wasn't a slow process that started at your feet and rushed up about a foot or so every ten seconds, we had time to prepare ourselves for that. I got blasted by volcanic ash, rocks and water and whatever else the flood had picked up and was completely submerged in more than twelve feet of water before I could register the white on white coming at me." Devyn shuddered and felt every muscle in his body clench in reflex to the memory of an event that had obviously given him nightmares. "Worse though, I think something bashed my head hard enough to make my lose consciousness or a period of time because the next thing I remember I've got this woman kneeling over me preforming mouth to mouth. And I've got blood dripping down my face mixed in with icy water. I'm thinking gang green and 'wow she's got pretty eyes' all at once and worse we're stuck more than five hundred feet above the ground on a shelf that the water and weathered away, we can't go back up the grade is far too great and I can't even climb down with her on my back because I've been running for twenty-four hours and was just unconscious for an unknown amount of time, I'm fading in and out of consciousness periodically and the satellite phones are out because she doesn't have waterproof batteries and mine got separated from me sometimes in the flood."

"I told you about that leg holster thing you've got there, Devyn." The icy look that she received would've been enough to stop anyone else in their tracks but painted a smile across the blonde's lips, grey eyes sparkling with good humor. "Calm down now and tell me what else happened on this camping trip from hell. What all did you have with you?"

The brunette upended the pint and pushed it away waving for another one and a round of shots with one dismissive gesture fumbling around in the pockets of his jeans, "Standard, I didn't change anything but I packed long johns and more polar weather gear."

Standard in Devyn Land was bare minimum for everyone else on the planet: a hydration pack, waterproof backpack with a sleeping bag compartment, heavy duty all seasons sleeping bag and liner, charcoal for water filtration, binoculars, compass, hatchet, knives, shovel, flash light and extra batteries, pot, fork, cup, flint, tissue, towel, soap, shampoo, toothbrush and toothpaste, first aid kit, clothes, snow goggles, compound bow and arrows, fishing rod and line, two weeks' worth of clean clothes with extra underwear and socks, swim trunks, and the Guardsmen symbol that he used as a sort of international passport and that was it.

Everything that was outer shell or mid shell was waterproof and he didn't take denim with him so none of his stuff got wet and he struck a fire with flint and dry flora. Standard in Devyn land was anything he could fit in a backpack and carry around comfortably so anyone who happened upon any of the stuff could only use so much because the kid found food even if he had to take out some of the local fauna with a trap and knife or the bow, everything was edible something that Cynthia had learned the hard way. Watching Devyn pin a Stantler buck on Route 207 five years ago submitted in her mind that everything that moves is food for something else, not every Pokemon was edible and that what they were doing was no different than buying steaks at a market. She only had to watch it die and it deserved that much from her.

The full implication of the desperation the Devyn must've felt at that moment dawned hard on Cynthia as did the fact that they were going to stumble all the way home and feel terrible in the morning. "What happened when you finally got back to Verdanturf?" she didn't get an answer as her friend did four shots off the counter in a row.

The sharpness of the blonde's voice did nothing to snap him out of the silent moment of dawning horror and shame that flooded the center of the brunette's chest because he wasn't sitting there in Mick's Bar with a friend drinking a beer and fishing for cigarettes in his pockets, he was back on the side of that mountain praying to any deity that would listen that they would survive the last harsh dregs of winter on Meteor Falls more than a hundred miles from civilization and while no one knew where they were at. He was back feeling the absolute horror that had ended his brief vacation in Verdanturf and set him out to find Erin.

"No, Cynthia. You tell me why you called me in a frenzy four months ago before I start with the part of this story you haven't heard yet." He sighed and leaned back taking his tankard with him as he drained it down to the film on the bottom.

The upwards thrust of his head brought the neck line of his white shirt close enough to the skin for her to see what she knew was there, the tattooed emblem of the Slateport Guard, the symbol was borrowed from the Leviathan God himself and viewed in the highest esteem in Port Cities all around the world despite whatever the favored local legend was. It was something that all fishermen and sailors seemed to have in common with each other and she admitted to herself that maybe it wouldn't hurt to share the undying faith that the Guardsmen seemed to have. The confidence to jump into a raging storm to help people was the only reason she was alive today because despite Drew's efforts she would've have made it if that fourteen year old boy hadn't come charging into the ocean to throw himself shoulder first into the Tentacruel that had a hold of her, it stunned it enough for him to get her loose and hot foot it back up the beach half carrying and half dragging her along behind him. Her first meeting with Devyn had drawn her to him with that magnetic personality and unbelievable work ethic and determination, the man was something else when he didn't doubt himself.

"Because I don't believe like you do, don't believe how you believe because I'm afraid of what will happen if I do." He set the empty chilled glass on the counter and looked at her closely, examining her with calm eyes. "You don't seem to be afraid of the Leviathan God, what he could do if he wanted to. You face down everything from Tropical Storms to Typhoons and Hurricanes because Slateport is on the division line between warm and cold. You've seen horrible things and look at it and know that it isn't some freak accident that no one could have predicted by an act of anger wrought upon you by your deity. Even Charlie has faith in the Behemoth God that rules over land and does horrible things from earthquakes to volcanic eruptions and-"

His left index finger pressed against her lips softly, delicately, "How is Forina sustained in all its glory?" he asked just as softly as his touch, "With Mt. Chimney spewing both lava and ash into it three to four times a year even if there isn't a full blown eruption and the tornadoes and storms battering it on their way further south or east across the Connectivity of Hoenn?"

"All those elements come together and provide what Forina needs to grow and flourish you know that, Devyn." The blonde answered instantly the point of this lesson gone far over her head.

"I know that but is it not the Behemoth God, Leviathan God and the Ziz Lord that puts forth efforts to destroy the beauty of the land but instead makes it come back more vibrant than ever. That's kind of how faith works; everything will be alright because if the Leviathan and Behemoth come together to clash the Ziz Lord will calm the giants and put them back to sleep. The storms brewed and earthquakes they cause are just tests of faith. They're Pokemon yes, dangerous things that have been imbued with powers from the original one through their creation, ignorance defines them as the _Weather Trio_ , those that do not believe that it was the Original One that created this level of existence."

She nodded slowly she understood what he was getting at, breaking away the dark fears in her heart and replacing them with the cold logic of their profession and the historical memory of the world. She knew well that the Leviathan God was created with the sea as its Mistress from the pressure in deep sea trenches and the Behemoth God was created by the hardening of magma and earth like Heatran, like the Ziz Lord was formed by Minerals in the ozone layer and that the Original One tasked them like the three dragons that controlled time, space and antimatter, the three aspects of knowledge, emotion and willpower, and the three terrible storms of ice, fire and electricity. These were things that everyone knew but not everyone believed.

Who could know for certain, the argument only came from people who believed that the Original One retreated at different times or just didn't exist in the first place. A foolish thought but a thought none the less that caused controversy.

"What you're worried about is that will happen if the supposed birth of the Tao Trio is the truth. Yang, yin, and wuji. What it means for the Dragon Masters because they came from one dragon, what that means for you if you become a Dragon Master and of course that that means for Erin." His degree in Religions of the world was showing clearly. "You fell in love with the Black Haired demon didn't you." It was like he just told her 'I Told You So' and he did but now wasn't the time for that.

Her head hit the bar as he ordered another round of Silver Wine, they bother were going to need it.


	3. Chapter 3

There was something that she found absolutely tedious and completely unworthy of her time in this place of lights and noise that the barbarians called a thrilling risk that she absolutely despised though it wasn't because she didn't understand the mechanics of the game or the probability that almost everyone had when they entered one of the halls dedicated to decadence and greed. That being said places like these were the source of much of the capital for her expeditions being that most of the employees were too dimwitted to know that they were being outsmarted by someone half or a fraction of their age, it seemed like this region of the world was plagued by the same stupidity and poor education that blighted the rest of the world. Though most would claim this to be her own fault and passed her so called luck off in casinos as her being too smart which was a lie, where she grew up even the dullest of children could do complex field equations in their heads so counting cards at a blackjack table from across the room hitting on both men and women alike was a trivial pastime she engaged in while waiting for her perpetually late companions to meet back at the designated point.

The point being: Charlie Lyhnnmann was a pain in the ass know it all about ninety percent of the time with a case of OCD that even the best shrinks in the world couldn't reason out and nothing worked which in the mind of their dearest Charlie confirmed that everyone else in the world was lax in their constitutions including Sundown who couldn't be on time for anything or remember some of the most basic instructions to save his life. Infuriating, insufferable, childlike, unintelligent, obedient, handsome, adorable, cringe worthy, sexy, adoring, loving, caring, gentle Sundown… she'd forgive him and his obligations to the Void every time because she loved him unconditionally.

Anyone who saw the young woman would automatically mistake her youth for foolishness or foolhardiness or maybe even an easy lay depending on who was looking and from what she understood people found her attractive enough though she couldn't comprehend why. In her mind and in the eyes of everyone else the barely five foot even frame she sported emphasized the minimal weight of her years which was not helped by the long unkempt dark blonde pony-tail that trailed down to the center of her back shot through with strands of charcoal and rich copper. That and her eyes that were either too wide or too shiny or whatever drew the attention of others and made her appear as a teenager in a pale bronze iris that alternated in shades from true liquid amber gold to almost black and everything in between, they were betraying things combined with her minimalist white t-shirt and jeans.

As she met the stunned expression on the dealer's face at the next table as she again won more than three million from the idiots sitting around her at the high stakes table she absently wondered if this stop was worth the trouble she was taking toiling here, she could almost feel her intelligence eroding away at the edges like chalk in water. Slateport was not her favorite city and the time of the Grand Festival was not her favorite time of year there were too many people and too many enclosed spaces in open areas to be even comfortable even in the vaguest sense of the word. Somehow it wasn't tiny passageways that you had to crawl on your stomach to get to the other side of or even sand traps that crushed the air out of your lungs as you exhales, not centuries old traps or disgruntled Pokémon guardians that she had an irrational fear of it was crowds of people.

Her aversion to human company had given her several very unfortunate names by her colleagues and just as she prepared herself to be devoid of species same company for the rest of her life she'd met Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock completely and utterly by chance in Blackthorn City where the annual conference for the more prominent and well-rounded archeologists of the world. Erin had been her only real friend for years before she was introduced to Cynthia and Devyn, followed by Jayr and Sundown. Gateway friend into a whole new world of faces and people who had things in common with her all because Erin had the patience of a Saint for her OCD like tendencies and spasmodic and almost single minded focus on her work.

Her mind flickered to the real reason she'd visited the city of steam and smoke stacks this time of year in during this particular time even with Sundown of all people, that have are or would ever exist, was experiencing problems at remote locations for their dig sites and encampments all over the world and the only loose end was Cynthia or more likely that tart that she had around with her. While Charlie did not understand why people did such stupid things for love she did understand the basic fundamentals of the affliction in short terms: Cynthia was pussy whipped and there wasn't a damn thing anyone could do about it besides Cynthia or maybe Devyn or Erin. Her suspicion of Dawn wasn't based on religion or superstition it was hard facts, she'd seen the girl on multiple occasions leaving places she had absolutely no business being if their conclusions about the girl but mainly the fact that neither Jayr nor Caitlin, of all people, liked her.

 _"She cannot be trusted,"_ the words drilled into her head with a delicious venom she recognized instantly, on high alert her eyes moved over the open floor of the casino searching for the one she knew was there, her spine went ramrod straight, dark blonde locks of hair falling into her face as the disgusted dealer pushed the enormous pile of chips across the table at her. He all but growled at the loss of the money and was glaring at her as if he knew that she was cheating but couldn't tell how, the electronic ping that went off under her chair a moment ago would've been enough for him to throw her out if it had come from her during the game.

There was a strict rule about psychics using their powers to gamble and the special monitoring system inside of casinos picked up on the transmission sent by psychics when they used their more famous abilities for mindreading and made a noise to alert the table. The fact that she had straightened and started looking around instantly for the source of the disturbance was the only reason that others were looking around as well, they wouldn't see what she was searching for though, they never did. She would have to get up and leave after this round but that was fine with her, the shaking in her limbs had begun as violent tremors at the thought of someone so easily accessing her mind and leaving didn't bother her in the slightest.

Her eyes locked on with avian precision and she stood, eyes flashing. "Miss are you okay, do you need security?" the voice was light and calm out of courtesy and a hint of that seemed to engulf the table.

"No, I am fine. I'm going to exchange my chips now and leave, my business associate just arrived." She swept the little plastic chips into one of the little sacks that they give you to use and hurried away from the table, heading to where she knew her associate would meet her by the tables that exchanged coin for money.

Elegantly draped against the door frame of one of the larger arches near the counter the tall woman leaned with an expression that was almost boredom; garbed in what one could describe as 'teenager Goth theme garb'. In all black from the neatly pressed black dress shirt and tie to the slacks, perfectly dressed and prim, with black sunglasses on. The sunglasses cut down the glare inside the casino, the brightness of the lights were chasing tears down the woman's face and those eyes were most likely red by now. The tears were an unfortunate side-affect that you had to endure when you were born with a genetic mutation that those of The Under and Those of the Void shared.

The fact that she was dressed in something that could be seen as 'normal' in most cultures could only mean that Caitlin was somewhere close by and had insisted that her disgruntled delegate turned partner take her out to see Slateport and accompany her to the Bicentennial Grand Festival. She stared defiantly into the thick blackness of the reflective lenses and knew that those eyes were closed, even with the dark shading their optic nerves were entirely too sensitive to light to remain open in a casino. A group of tourists must've realized who she was because they stopped and gawked awkwardly before a low snarling growl that was more felt than heard sent them running away.

That, without a shadow of a doubt, was Jayr.

She stepped towards the counter and pushed the bag over smiling pleasantly as the clerk behind the counter congratulated her on her winnings and alerting her of multiple other events during this month. The clerk smiled at her and dealt out fresh hundred stacks onto the top of the counter, Charlie reached forward to push it all into the triple lock backpack she wore and froze. _"Look it's Dawn."_ A flicker of motion at the corner of her eye and Charlie whirled as the unmistakable image of Dawn brushed past her shoulder and disappeared further into a crowd of people.

"Where's she going?" she mouthed turning completely around she let her eyes wander after the girl who always, at least in the mind of Charlie Lyhnnmann and that was all that mattered thank you very much, up to something. The gut instinct was never wrong especially with what had happened next, shoving the cash into her bag and setting the three locks into place she turned with the full intention of rushing after her and asking where Cynthia was… a strong masculine arm wrapped around her waist pulling her tight against the muscular planes of a well-developed chest and stomach, a large hand drawing her head around to meet soft lips and the drowning dark scent of cloves. Sundown.

The large man looked down at her with black eyes and flicked them towards Dawn; that was never a good sign in Sundown land it meant that Jayr was perfectly aware of what was going on and had set him to dance on the edge of legality and trail the girl. He was apologizing now before he had to shadow her for the entire night, staring into the handsome face she had to forgive the perpetually tanned man for that fault of his, the instinctive hardwiring to follow Jayr in everything that she commanded. Sometimes though she just wished that she could spend a night with her fiancée without something coming up, her schedule would have to be amended for the rest of the night. But now she had something to do with that time, find Cynthia because wherever the tart was her friend was sure to follow.

-ooo-

Her room was dark and quiet in the early morning light, the coolness of the working fan touched her skin still damp from the shower, the benefit of years as a Guardsman she had developed a legendary alcohol tolerance that knocked off the drunken haze she'd been experiencing the night before. The state she was left in was a strange headspace where she remembered waking up curled around the red head the sweet scent of flowers filtering through the open window. A place made even strange when you're in bed with another woman lying on her left arm, allowing sensation back into her forelimb as Cynthia rolled over. There was more than enough room for them both on the queen sized mattress, where the blonde normally stayed when she visited.

There was a bristling sensation at the back of her neck that drew her attention up and to the slight creeping sound of someone standing just outside her door, an internal sense of being watched that must've served the early ancestors of her people as a warning signal to them being hunted. Hunting was a very good thing, a useful tool that the young girl in the hallway obviously hadn't learned yet. Alerting your prey to your position was a surefire way to go home hungry.

Her lessons with her father and grandfather returned to her vividly, the laws of hunting and meat were simple enough to understand but it seemed as if her young and inexperienced stalker did not know the second and perhaps the most important law of meat. Not everything that you hunt is prey.

The blonde in her arms shifted at the pressure of fingers on her hip, the subtle signal to wake up but stay quiet. With her back to the door there was no conceivable way that Devyn could turn around and not have Dawn bolt for cover somewhere in the house and pass it off as her having to use the bathroom. However Devyn could provide enough cover for Cynthia to get a good handle on what was happening, puzzle the girl's reasoning, and help come up with a plan to stop it.

A finger slipped just beneath the waistband of her boxers.

The faintest touch of skin on skin sent a bucket of ice down her spine in such a way that it took every bit of discipline to keep from shuddering, the door had been locked and now it was opened. Ajar. There was a tightening of muscles down the front of her body in response to her movement and carefully she tightened her core against Cynthia's side. Any more movement would have been noticeable but she prepared her body as well as she could for springing clear of the bed and engaging in a fight.

Chances were that there would be no need to gain her feet to overpower the teenage girl but after their experience outside the Relic Castle with Darmanitan in Zen Mode making their way slowly up to the campsite and lighting it on fire you never knew. The statues had moved and come after them because they thought that the team had been there to desiccate the site like tomb raiders of the past centuries. The things had given everyone a scare but after putting the flames out they had managed to get across to the angry guardians that they meant no harm and intended to take nothing but knowledge from the city. They had been watched closely night and day for the duration of their stay regardless of the fact that their claims were true with the exception of the Volcarona that Charlie had friended that chose to come with them.

Relaxing entirely into the bed Cynthia scooted until their bodies were pressed flush against one another and laid a gentle kiss to the center of her chest. "Devyn," she whispered softly, sleepily, "Are you awake?"

-ooo-

Silently Cynthia begged him to go along with her, feeling the skyrocketing pulse of his heart beneath her lips and imagining the rushing sound of his own heart in his ears. Over his shoulder she could just make out a stiff black shape against the charcoal cave of the hallway at the sound of her voice, could almost feel Dawn's fear of discovery and was tempted to laugh at it. She wasn't as smart as she seemed to think that she was and she wasn't nearly the hunter that Erin or even Devyn was.

Her eyes fluttered closed at the very thought of Erin, a strange fixation that came after the end of yet another awkward spell that she'd spent with Devyn. He was a sweet boy, excellent guardsmen, outright brilliant archeologist, fearless adventurer, the yin to her yang, the balance to her chaos, the other side of her coin, and sometimes when she was in need of it he served as her brother, boyfriend, best friend, and lover.

"Hmmm?" his voice was deeper with sleep and disuse.

"Hey, Devyn, can I tell you something about Erin?" she saw her lover shift and lean in towards the door, the girl was waiting with baited breath for whatever would come next with the utterance of her name. There was a low sound in his throat, a rumbling noise of acquiescence. "There's something about Erin that makes me nervous in ways that make no sense, I mean beyond the normal unnerving quality she's got about her. And well she interests me in a way that's dangerous."

"Ah." He was listening and Dawn seemed about ready to fall through the gap she had made in the door as Cynthia continued.

"I… I slept with Erin." Devyn sat bolt upright in bed, his arms lifting her easily onto her knees as she startled violently. There was a strangled gasp from the hallway as something slammed into the door cutting off Dawn's life line. The little Nipper clicked the lock back in place and moved back to his little bed on the other side of the nightstand.

"How." The command was low and dangerous as frozen pale green like tundra grass met the misted disheveled grey.

The words came out rushed, "When we were at the villa in Undella Town, we went free diving and you went with Caitlin to make sure that she was alright. Erin invited me to go with her to the Whirl Islands to try to connect the pieces of our puzzle." In her mind she could see Erin clearly that day. She remembered seeing the Dragon Master on the bow of the ship they'd taken out looking wild and feral as the creatures that she "controlled" an uninhibited fierce joy in her eyes that drew the darkness of the purple down further from just a dark amethyst to a color that was almost black. Already garbed in a pair of black board shorts and a red tank top the dragon master was displaying the myriad of tattoos, emblazoned so that they appeared to be burned into bronze skin, that covered almost every available inch of her arms specific patterns of her back, the complete meaning a mystery to all except the members of the three clans (Lynch, Kirkland and Braddock) and their numerous subsidiaries. She'd let knee length black hair fall free around her shoulders, dancing in the wind as she stared straight up into the sky watching the flying leviathan angle through clouds high overhead.

"Things were going good for the first few days, we made excellent time and I found something. We cracked open a bottle of champagne and got to celebrating and she said something to me that I won't ever forget:

-ooo-

 _Olivine at night was really a sight to be seen, the lights of the fishing town glittered like jewels off the waters of the bay illuminating the sides of the boats moored for the night with a gentle white light. The movement of the boat beneath her feet had become a constant reassuring motion that had rocked her to sleep for two months as they explored more of the Whirl Islands than ever before done in one go. The close quarters with no one but the Dragon Master, the Dragon, her Garchomp, Spiritomb, Milotic, Braviary, Lucario, and Eelektross, she had learned a great deal about herself. That and more about the tidal differences between Johto and Unova than she had before, a surprisingly interesting find that had amazed her with how much it had amazed her._

 _They had stopped far enough from the bay to be out of the way of the shipping lanes but close enough that the view of the Legendary Lighthouse was put into sharp relief against the vastness of the Southern Johto Plains and that the tidal flow here would move them back into shore with its changing. The gentle countryside had become a familiar shape in the distance from the Islands and had a calming effect on her emotions with every weekly trip to shore to restock supplies. Whoever said that romance was dead obviously had never been on a ship sharing a cold platter of cheese and salted meats, a wine, and stories with a surprisingly refined Dragon Master in Olivine's harbor staring up at the immense hulking white form of the lighthouse against the lights of the city._

 _Romance clearly was still thriving._

 _"So, how long have you lived in the Independent Nation of Hoenn?" the formality of the region's entire title seemed to be a bit arrogant but then one must consider that each different region is a different country, a fact that was further reinforced by the need for a passport every time you thought to travel elsewhere. "I mean as a whole?"_

 _"On and off for most of my life." The black haired woman leaned back against one of the rope tie offs for the folded sails and sighed in contentment, "My father is a Lynch and my mother is a Kirkland Braddock, the area around Meteor Falls is Lynch land and I spent most of my school days in and around Rustboro and Fallabor. Most of my winter and spring vacations around Forina. My summers were spent on Kirkland and Braddock land which are the Blackthorn and Opelucid areas respectively. Once I got older I decided to move to Lilycove because it's just about as far away as you can get and still be in the Connectivity, you know?"_

 _"Ah… I see." And she did, she had spent a great deal of time in Opelucid City herself and knew well that the man who controlled the area, as mayor, gym leader, and leader of the clan there, was a fierce creature. She didn't envy the childhood that Erin must've had with him for a grandfather even if she only saw him certain summers._

 _"What about you, Miss Champion. How did you manage to land a spot as Champion of a region that you don't live in? Isn't that illegal unless you were crowned Champion of Mt. Battle or the Champion League?"_

 _The blonde laughed and took a sip from the glass of red wine before placing it carefully back on the deck where it undulated slowly with the waves against the deck. "I got a research grant and to pay my bills I decided to take the gym challenge because as you well know for each gym you successfully manage you get a monetary reward as well as a badge. Before I knew it I was a citizen of two countries and had mounted the steps for the League and conquered it. Apparently you can retain dual citizenship in Sinnoh for any other region, they didn't seem to care that I live in Unova most of the year for tax purposes and only rent out a small place when the league is in session. It's a backwards kind of thing."_

 _"Does the Sinnoh League not recognize the right of Battle to become Champion?" Cynthia shook her head at that and sighed wistfully, "Ah then the rumor is true, are you still trying to get that overturned."_

 _"Yes. I don't see how you won't let someone who can best the current champion become the champion. It's only fair." Ah there was that word that Erin despised, the low growling base that echoed from the bow of the ship told her clearly that Shannis had heard it as well and there was a bright but small firework of blue sparks that signaled his displeasure before he lay his head down again._

 _"You also can't just hand your title to anyone can you?" the question wasn't a question but it didn't matter because Cynthia found herself painfully enthralled by the movement of the muscles in Erin's arms, chest, and back as she stretched._

 _Watching her companion had become something of a hobby of hers during the last two months and still the movement of those intricate designs had astounded her, they caught her eyes in their strange dark and light tones of blue, purple, black, silver, and white. As far as she could tell the geometric and abstract patterns signified something important, some sort of rank in the hierarchy of the Clans. The colors seemed to detonate which clan that an individual belonged to but didn't clash with the war paint that they all wore with the same strange sort of reverence and honesty no matter where in the world that they were. From memory she could see the deep blue and white on Clair and the same on Lance with a gracing of silver winding its way through like a ribbon. She had seen the purple on Drake with the same arrogant and bold white patterns with the same silver, and the Black on Iris and Drayden though only Drayden had the silver while Iris had a strange gold coloring that seemed to mark her as an outsider but one of them all the same. Every color had significance but she knew that she didn't have all the code down; the white seemed to only ever be on the accessible parts of the body, places you could easily reach in distinct symbols, and not everyone had the same patterns._

 _Her eyes openly traced a line of silver until it disappeared down around one of Erin's hips and the world swam for a moment, it seemed to have been long enough for her to reach out and touch the coil of muscle that rolled down that arm. "Erin… I think…"_

 _"Dawn's not right for you." Those rough words almost jolted sense back into her brain but strong hands had seized her around the waist and pulled her half the distance between them forcing her to meet unnerving purple eyes. In the faint light they seemed to glow with the light of the bay giving her eyes a silver gleam like the eyes of predators to that already almost unnatural gaze. "She never was because she doesn't get you and she won't."_

 _"What are you-", the deck moved violently and a slithering splash signaled the nighttime dive of their third unseen companion, her glass spilled, the suddenness of it all took her breath._

 _"Listen, and listen well, Cher." The husky tone of her voice sent a thrill through at the term of endearment common throughout Lilycove but uncommon to her ears through the black haired woman's lips. The words seemed completely incongruous to the very nature of the wild creature sitting before her but they fit, the calm and almost tame air that seemed to roll off of her like waves whenever she was around a certain group of people. She scooted further into the calming embrace and rested her head against the taller woman's collarbone; it startled her on a deep level when she considered that she was in a committed relationship with someone. Somehow touching Erin was startlingly comfortable._

 _"People are like dragons and since you train dragons you will be able to understand what I am about to say. When the world was created it became common knowledge that that those who lived with dragons were superior to others because like those they lived with they felt everything at once." Erin's hand rested heavily on her back, rubbing it comfortingly. "As you well know Arceus' dragon plate amplified and enhances the power of whatever was just there. It seems like this rubs off on people in unexpected ways, this is one of the speculated reasons that dragon trainers flourish and live more 'colorful' lives. Most people can't dedicate one hundred percent of themselves to anything and that is why the Clans say that most people don't know what it means to live. Dawn couldn't understand how you can give one hundred percent to everything you do from archeology to battling. She thought it was an act as a result of petty secular emotion, the depth of a puddle, she found a reason to hate you for it."_

 _Her fingers tightened against the plain white t-shirt that Erin had pulled on after coming out of the shower the earlier this morning. "Is it really that obvious?" she whispered haltingly pulling back to read the absolute true in those eyes. Grey eyes met purple and the raw emotion that boiled inside of the black haired woman._

 _"I, however, have no such reserves; you share nothing in common with her anymore, you've grown apart. I enjoy our conversations, debates, stances on pressing matters, and I enjoy your sense of humor and that brilliant mind and vibrant personality. You have to be the single most beautiful and intelligent woman I've met. I am not going to lie to you, I want you. I want you badly."_

 _She leaned up and nipped Erin's chin before she realized what she was doing, steel arm locked under her butt and her legs went instinctively around Erin's waist as the effortless strength of the Dragon Master lift carried her away. Her mouth found Erin's as she made her way down the three stairs and through the door into the living compartment with an ease and confidence that none of her former lovers had possessed, few of them had carried her like this and fewer still had the balance part of lifting down enough to not stumble or wobble. It was almost as if she was making her way down like every other night. Her hand came up easily to push in the door to one of the two rooms and deposited her load on the bed dominating the space._

 _Cynthia sat up and fumbled for the silvered buckle of her shorts, swatting both of the hands that had come to help her assistance. She threaded the belt free of her belt loops and tossed the belt away and leaned back as bronzed fingers worked their way up her legs, caressing the inside of her thighs with a deep, smooth, even pressure that had Cynthia clenching her jaw in an effort not to writhe. It felt good in the same way that massages do and the tender insides of her thighs, her fingers pressed deeper moving higher and higher._

 _She slid back with the assistance of those hands, the bed shifts as a knee settled between her legs. The sensed weight of the taller woman as her fingers moved up her body, catching her shirt and pulling it up with an agonizing slowness that made her reach out for Erin. "Erin…"_

 _"Hush," she leaned down and pressed lips to the underside of her jaw, "I want to savor you, Cher." Her body moved up against the smaller woman beneath her, teeth worked against her throat alternating between rough and soft. "Now then will you do what I say?"_

 _Cynthia looked up and at her and made a derisive decision, a choice to indulge in something she was certain would never repeat if her relationship with Dawn was to last the few months that if had left. Why not indulge in something just once, just a taste and she would be through with it, Cynthia nodded._

 _"Go and hold onto the headboard." Just a taste and she would go back to her life with Dawn however long that may be._


	4. Chapter 4

Her heart ached painfully in her chest as the words spilled unbidden from her throat, her mouth betraying her in the worst way possible. These were things that were supposed to stay on the inside and yet they all flew from her like a flashflood in the wake of a soul with which she could trust her deepest secrets. Wasn't it Devyn that she had first broached the question of masturbation with three years ago? Wasn't it Devyn that she had told the day after she lost her virginity? Wasn't it Devyn that had cared for her through the worst of her depression and the height of her glory? Wasn't it Devyn that she shared everything with like she would a sister if she had one? It was and it always had been.

There was a bitterness to what had occurred the night before and it sat heavily upon her conscious as he lay comfortably back in the webbing of the hammock. Arms crossed behind his head he reeled at the information that he had been given. Reporters had all but begged the former Champion of Sinnoh for exclusive interviews after she threw the fight with Dawn, people had thought that she had lost her edge and didn't dare think of the alternative. The fact that she was hoping that someone would take her title away didn't seem to cross their mind, the world was in an uproar when the very next year she took her title back. They didn't know that she had gotten bored, it had been a slow year for Blue Archeology and a slow year meant that she had nothing to do.

She had gone all out against Dawn slaughtering the young woman's airheaded thoughts that she had somehow earned the title either by her skill in battle or her skill in bed. Cynthia thought that it had something to do with Dawn's betrayal but Devyn didn't think so. There was a shrewdness to it that didn't speak of something that petty being the motivation for what she was doing. Personally Devyn was convinced that she was being offered both money and power something that the teenager would jump at the very second she got her hands on it.

Cynthia had gone on to tell her about her enigmatic Dragon Master Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock and the events that had led to her sleeping with the other woman during their exploration of the Whirl Islands. The secret hope in Devyn's heart had been that Cynthia would finally realize the full extent of what Dawn was doing to her especially at the admission that her just once had turned into just once per night. A part of her glowed with the satisfaction that the hardworking, determined Cynthia had been physically satisfied for a time.

A point that she would have to congratulate Erin on the very next time she saw her, she knew first-hand how hard it was to keep up with the sexual appetite of the Champion and would envy Dawn like half of the world if she wasn't playing the position of the true lover for Cynthia almost every time she visited Slateport.

She stretched as much as her position would allow and rested a hand against the small of the blonde's back staring up at the lightening sky and sighed contentedly. The conversation had had begun on Devyn's bed and lead outside to the one place where if Dawn wanted to listen in she would have to sit on the porch because the plate glass door made no sound and the windows were coated with a special polymer that was designed to dampen the sound of the wind and rain of the autumnal storms that rocked the Southern Tip of the Connectivity of Hoenn.

-ooo-

Closing his eyes Devyn begun to doze and had just nodded off for the third time that night when Dawn's rosy light filtered across the two serenely relaxed figures laying together on the hammock. The wide bleached netting kept their bodies comfortably aloft beneath the hand knit purple and grey afghan that fought off the slight chill of the ocean breeze on mid-spring morning.

Cynthia lay with her head against her friend's chest, exhausted both physically and emotionally completely oblivious to the hateful eyes of the teenager standing just beyond the smoky plate glass door searching for something to justify her screaming at them. She found nothing but knew that she knew she had been listening in for a while, after she admitted in the common tongue of the League affiliated countries she had started with a long string of the foreign tongue of the Independent Nation of Hoenn. The musical language was wonderful to hear but made about as much since to her as the hieroglyphics on the walls of ruins.

She tried to wrap her head around why Cynthia would want someone else to touch her, why she had chosen to spend the night with Devyn and not her. She was hurt because the Boss had been right; Cynthia was just using her for her own personal gain. A sexual conquest, another notch in the bedpost and her admitting that she slept with Erin was just another piece of evidence against her.

Her eyes burned hatefully into the man her girlfriend was curled up with, his upper shoulders and chest were heavily muscled and she could make out the distinguishing tattoo of the Guardsmen on his shoulder. The perfect circle was at the place on his bicep where the arm met the torso covering the complete roundness of the ball-in-socket joint. The two leg like lines came parallel to one another down his arm at an angle so they ended on both the on either side of his bicep, the jagged lines extended one down the front of his body to stop just above his nipple and the other down the back of his body to hit just above the end of his shoulder blade. The red inked thing should have meant that he could be trusted but his bare upper torso made her wonder if he was all nude, made her jealous even as the logical part of her brain screamed at her to use her common sense.

The logical part of her brain remembered the conversation that she had had with Cynthia about the man, the sibling like relationship had been explained to her as best as the Champion could manage which wasn't very well to start with, a concept she was unable to relate to as an only child who acquired friends like she acquired pokemon. For her own gain when they no longer benefitted her she moved on and made new friends. _"Devyn is like that sibling that you love and you hate and you love but you can't stand but who understands you more than anyone else and who you understand more than anyone else and that you can't bear to be around but that you can't bear not to be around, if that makes sense?"_ the older blonde had once tried to explain.

A shudder ran up her spine as she considered what would happen if she lost the protection offered to her by being with Cynthia, no member of Blue Archeology would dare lay a hand on her as long as she was making Cynthia happy but if she botched it and ruined the relationship that she shared she would be free game. Fresh meat for anyone who got a hold of her and she prayed that it was Erin. Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock was the rawest human that she had ever come into contact with and if she fell into Erin's hands for her punishment she would be dealt a swift and merciful death after willingly giving all the information she had after the threat of being given to Jayr of Sundown as a pet.

If she was supremely unlucky and either Jayr or Sundown got a hold of her she would be begging anyone and everyone for death. They would torture her and enjoy it, even if she willingly told them all she knew they wouldn't care. In their minds she was a traitor, and she was, and that meant that by their law she was susceptible to a punishment which the betrayed decided upon. A shudder passed up her skin as she remembered the hushed whisper of her homeland, the place where one of the Void Colonies were located, rumors that they kidnapped girls and raped them, made them pregnant with their children over and over again until they could no longer bear children. When they could no longer have children they were eaten slowly limb by limb until there was nothing left.

And if Sundown took her to Winter…

Winter...

Her stomach heaved violently the spasm rippling through her body and threatening to loosen her bladder, bile rose in her throat a symptom of pure animal panic that blistered through her mind like an icy wind freezing her limbs to the spot. Winter was anyone's perfect nightmare come to life, the Conquest Icon of the Damned, the ruler of The Deep and uncontested mistress of The Under. If she was brought before Winter then she would tell anything that the woman wanted and admit to crimes she did not commit just to get away from the Black Master, hopefully she would please the master and be rewarded with a relatively less cruel death. If she wasn't then she was to be smuggled into the lawless country of Orre, hidden in places in The Under that were deeper than The Deep and shown the true horror of the Void.

The _Black Master_ was the only accurate name for the demon girl who had been born Rachel Schuyler Sullivan in The Under twenty-six years ago. From an early age she displayed split personalities and an affinity for the Void and everything that it entitled, Dark types flocked to her from far and wide all coming to heel before their mutually accepted master. Dark Types were violent and malicious things that took a strong will to tame, to tame them without having spent any time with them made the threat even more real, the unconceivable power that rolled through her veins thick and slow like the blood of sleeping giants even more terrible. By the age of six the already sadistic girl was taken in by the mysterious benefactor of the Void Colony in Mauville and trained to control the primal sensory power that came with those who were _"of the Void"_ , removed from her homeland it seemed as if the connection with whatever was the fuel for their power she spiraled down into blackness. She was the dark equivalent of Caitlin, born with an extraordinary amount of power to draw upon and an aptitude for it, and trained and drilled like Sabrina until it was second nature.

Winter would take her sweetly, lovingly into the dark and she would welcome it... she would beg for the end of it all and the final release that would accompany and even facilitate her death.

No!

Winter was not a creature to be messed by the likes of her, not even the Boss would dare to cross the path of such a beast yet and then he would be lucky to escape. He was a sadist and maybe enough of a sadist to match Winter taste for taste but he was not a masochist and could never serve as a bottom, he would never break Winter even if he tried for centuries. She was starting to understand just why the woman was given the second name with which a strong and undeniable meaning, she was a thing born of absolute cold and absolute unfeeling… Winter was the season of death the emptiness that all returned to whether they wanted to or not.

Unless you had a death wish you wouldn't dare face Winter with your bare hands and nothing at your back but the promise of the spring months battering away the grip of death's fingers. There was only one reason you would willingly take such a course of action, such a path to your demise, you wanted to know what it felt like to endure such a pleasurable torment to know what ecstasy that the dark held and so dearly and secretly. A gamble you were willing to make with the concept of absolute nothingness itself, the odds were not in your favor if you chose death by evil.

In her head Dawn couldn't bring herself to blame Winter for it, you cannot blame evil for being evil. She shook off the dark feeling and sat back on her heels without a word and turned back to turn her attention.

-ooo-

The warrior was beginning the methodical slaughter of the gyms again, the action as familiar and boring as an exercise routine that you practiced and a route you ran every day of the week for the past year. It was just something that you did apathetically and more because you felt obligated to than any other reason; you garnered no joy from it and did it because it had to be done if you wanted to feel right about yourself and to feel well. Whether it be about your health or about your natural ability with a sword or your duty to your family. One day she would waltz through the door and demand a battle with the gym leader for an official league badge and the next day she would be walking into the gym the next town over making the same demands of the next fool on the list. The Champion that could never be Champion walked with an air of superiority that had been hard earned through hours and hours of grueling training, going places and doing things that no one could imagine and many did not have the mental fortitude to do the same. The impossible route that she had taken to the top; to be best of the best had led her to the place where she was meant to be.

Being the Greatest that Ever Lived, a title that the League had given her and not one that she claimed herself put her in a very unique position. The chance to display an aptitude that many did not know that she possessed, the aptitude to teach.

Leaving home the day after the Autumn Equinox festivities ended she had laid claim to a badge from every gym in Unova conquering Drayden with a might blow that would go down in the record books as the hardest anyone had ever hit their grandfather. He had given her a deep scowl of approval and handed over a Legend Badge only because the rules dictated that she was given something in compensation for the work that had been done to defeat the Gym Leader.

The next day she had taken down Brycen and stood in an ankle deep puddle of water giving tips on how to handle fire types with ice types while offhandedly accepting the Freeze Badge. Two days after she was talking to Skyla about how boosting your speed will help you outstrip the electricity that clipped birds wings while pocketing yet another Jet Badge. Clay had sheepishly admitted that he had gotten overconfident and knew his mistake while all but pushing the Quake Badge into her fingers. Elesa three days after had been stunned into silence while she explained that the problem with electric types was that their accuracy sucks and graciously accepted the Bolt Badge to help mend the feelings of the young woman. Burgh had all but given her the Insect Badge late that afternoon while excitedly showing her his newest collection of pictures happy that the battle was over, he already knew that if he was more serious then he would be a better trainer. She'd spent a week with Lenora after winning the Basic Badge sharing her findings with the fellow member of Blue Archeology as well as offering some moveset tips to the taller woman. And finally spent she spent two days beating some sense into Cress, Cilan and Chili after all but raping them taking down all three within a matter of five minutes and earning the Trio Badge, the first badge of a region is supposed to be easier than the last but you're not supposed to all but give them away.

Earning the Beacon Badge from Volkner, the Icicle Badge from Candice, the Mine Badge from Bryon, the Relic Badge from Fantina, the Fen Badge from Crasher Wake, the Cobble Badge from Maylene, the Forest Badge from Gardenia, the Coal Badge from Roark in Sinnoh had taken her longer they were a lot strong opponents who took their job seriously. They took constructive criticism and had showed genuine enthusiasm and joy when she had arrived from the nearby Unova Region to share her experience with both professionals and rookies just starting out alike.

She had reached Hoenn in the mid-Winter and tore through the efforts of Wallace, Tate and Liza, Winona, Normal, Flannery, Wattson, Brawly and Roxanne with a fierce determination that she had always possessed, paying homage to the trainers of her "native" lands in the only way that any of them would accept. As such the Rain, Mind, father, Balance, Heat, Dynamo, Knuckle, and Stone Badges all but fell into her lap with a lot of playful anger and banter to go with them. In late winter she had gone to the Indigo League and had taken the Jade Star Badge, Spike Shell Badge, Sea Ruby Badge, and Coral Eye Badge with nothing but the strength and trust she had built with each of her partners.

The badges of the connected Kanto and Johto (Earth, Volcano, Marsh, Soul, Rainbow, Thunder, Cascade, Boulder, Zypher, Hive, Plain, Fog, Storm, Mineral, and Glacier) and the lessons came easily, all that was left was the Badge she was going to have to work for, to strain and struggle with until it was in her hands. She chose her path carefully wanting to land here waiting to gain the Rising Badge approaching late spring, it was a tradition that she only ever fought with Clair in late spring… it was before Lance returned home to steal her confidence with his naturally higher place in the Clan.

If she would calm down and not listen to the prick then she wouldn't lose to him ever but… you can say things and then you could show them. The Kirkland Clan was very traditional: the place that your parents held was the only place you could ever be, the place that determined your success in the world. She would break them of that starting with Clair.

With arrogant strides the Champion that would never be Champion and Leader that would forever be Leader left the impression of her boot in the soft earth that made up the long winding trail to the newest construction of the Blackthorn City Gym with a cruel smile on her lips as she remembered the events that had led to the need for a new gym to be constructed, yet again. Between herself and her two cousins the fights got to be intense and the last time she'd shown up her demanding yet another badge for her personal reasons as well as to light a fire in Clair's belly Lance had decided to stick his nose where it wasn't wanted claiming that he could beat them both.

Needless to say the night turned into a three way Battle Royale which only ended after she personally had ordered the fatal blow that ended the life of his Dragonite though through his only arrogance and carelessness as a trainer it was bound to happen sometime. A dragon only fell alone if its partner thought themselves superior to their dragon; a dragon only fell in battle to other dragons that were bound perfectly to their partners accepting one another as equals and that was exactly what she was. Equal to her dragons and no one else in the world, or at least a challenger had yet to arrive that would stand a chance, not even the Ketchum boy though it wasn't for lack of trying.

"Devastatingly powerful", those were the words that were used to describe her in the last match against her grandfather Drake during the last battle she had with the Hoenn League at which time the top trainers and masters had decided that it was best to elevate her status to that of "Grand Master" and leave it at that thus forbidding her to open a gym in a city or to claim Championship over the region because that would be a step down. It was at that time she started periodically travelling the world every two years demanding badges in what some of the less educated called a desperate cry for attention from a person who had left themselves without a challenge or goal having burned out the fire too young, those people had never been inside a gym while she challenged the leader. None of them had been to class while it had been in session.

No one really understood her need to teach except maybe Drake and definitely Drayden and Iris... why she kept the badges that she earns sitting in a shoe box under her bed upon her return home, the badges weren't the least bit important monitoring the progress of the Gym Leaders thus insuring that everyone grew stronger was the key. Some of the people watching also understood the second reason she competed in every tournament only to gracefully bow out in the semi-finals, to show people what a strong bond between a trainer and their Pokémon could do. Not just the might of the combined blood of the dragon master's clan could do. That was why she put up the arrogant act in front of others, the cocky statements and superiority made people look at her acts instead of focusing in on the words that she said, when Erin spoke it was for a purpose and so she had taken to not saying much of anything and even fewer people understood that.

When class was in session she pointed out things with short clipped sentences, speaking in a manner as if she was addressing a class of a thousand students in a lecture hall at the major universities.

Gravel crunched beneath her boots now, loud enough to her the difference in her tread and his, his tread had once climbed this mountain alone after his partner feeling the burning shame of difference in the link between them like nothing else. The hot hatred that she had had for everyone who could live peacefully in the valley unplagued by the nightmares and the horrible things that she saw everywhere, the taste had been metallic and made him want to slaughter them all and he would have but that was not what had been in her true heart of hearts. The people down there did not understand but she had long since stopped blaming them for that, ever since she retreated into herself and into him never to surface again. People had tried to get her to leave that shell once they understood the horrible things that it had done to her but by then it was too late and their efforts were nothing but tapping along her clavicle, painful and annoying and she wanted them to stop and when she couldn't make them stop he did it for her. He was always there and had always been there since the day they were first joined together by fate or by destiny or whatever you chose to call it, they were one and they were all together they were more powerful than any foe and together they could stand upon this earth and sing to the heavens the lamentations of a world that crumbled to pieces around them.

A gentle breeze cut up the side of the mountain fanning out the early summer grasses and the gentle purple flowers that grew in the brush up and down the sides of the rock well over three hundred feet up from the mouth of the Dragon's Den. Something rustled in the grass, something small that found its end in a crunch of unmerciful teeth on bone as he turned his head and long neck to snap up the morsel of soft flesh as if it were a fly that a human would bat at. It had been curious about him and why he was so small, so lean compared other dragons that inhabited the mountain side and the foothills below hunting in the low country instead of among the spires as the graceful ribbons of blue death did. Whatever it was died before it could scream and was in his belly before the low rumbling issued up from his chest, she felt it in her chest and inner ears turning around to him casually even as the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end and her senses kicked into high alert.

She looked dead into piercing blue eyes and he looked every bit the monster that other peoples in other places thought that he was, he looked evil although if the varnish of his scale was black instead of blue he would've looked every bit the death he promised to her enemies and anything he deemed to be food. The covering of undiluted pure sea blue scales that shone in the noon sun covered most of his body in an almost chain mail of smooth scales, the chain mail covered most of his body trailing down into thick barbs on the end of a blue tail. His belly was covered in thick white bands of scale hard enough to protect his delicate insides and most importantly air bladders from being pierced even by a vicious attack from a male Garchomp, something they had both found out in one hard stopping moment back when they were still young and therefore ignorant to the ways of the world as they were not now. His wings flared at his side, the red half scale/ half leather/ half something she had no name for material stretched between the taunt framing bones of his wings but also covered his throat, the skin between his limbs and body, the underside of his tail and sat in eyebrow like patches above each of those glowing eyes. Those markings drew attention outwards to the three spikes that jutted from either side of his head already the almost black/blue that females of his species looked for when in heat.

His small size had ruled him out for most of the mating flights but the battles were still intense yet he bore no scar from such events, the muscles beneath the scales bulged and rippled, coiling tighter and tighter as he opened that red mouth and hissed at her. A trail of thick blue smoke wafted from his maw as a forked tongue flicked over serrated teeth long as her hand and numerous to make any shark envious. The gravel gave a moaning sound as the meat beneath his skin lining his legs tightened even further dragging thick six inch long claws into the earth, his wings extended slowly from his body in a gesture of challenge revealing all thirty eight feet of his impressive wingspan and the only modifications she'd made to the body of the young male runt of his clutch, the young male that should've died to many times over and yet still survived. Beneath each of his wings she'd etched a rune, a delicate swirling pattern that knotted in on itself without ever touching around a single black dot, in a special paint. In times of war she would etch more carefully onto his body but this were times of peace or at least they had been until just a moment ago, he leaned his entire body downwards, crouching low enough that his shoulders were beneath hers though they normally towered inches over her head, his lean body shivered with anticipation as his neck extended ramrod straight eyes focused on something that she could not see.

Before the roar accompanied by the jet of brilliant cerulean fire erupted from his throat she was in motion, one hand on the far right side of his stiff neck to assist her in guiding her onto his back in the space between the jut of his now flared wings and the juncture of his neck and body where the plate like structures that protected his surprisingly sensitive and flexible spine from harm. He was in the air climbing higher with each powerful stroke of his wings before the heat of his flame could even grace his partner's face, winging into the cloud cover faster than should've been possible for a dragon of his breed but he was the runt, the slender runt that wasn't further around the middle than a Rapidash with wings that had grown to full expected size of males of his species. He could fly circles around any competition and he proved that now, rolling so that his back and therefore her back was facing the sun making himself a harder target to see as well as giving her the opportunity to scout out the black dots that were now trying to catch up with the impressive climb.

The wind ripped at her clothes as he tore open the doors that separated her mind from his, the threads of their bond exploding into vivid life as the sensory bombardment began, him climbing ever high all the time. The young male put on another burst of speed pulling further ahead of his opponents, a trumpet of his roar echoing off the ancient stones as his mind calmly but urgently demanded a pale of action from her and now. Their bond was one made by the Great Bonded Heroes of old, crafted specifically so the most unusual and unlikeliest of dragons was paired with the best human for him the cold calculative mind coming in contact with the cunning that pooled between them. She and He could out think any opponent as well as out fly them and with her astride his neck with no space between her slender fingers and his the relay time was instantaneous between the two of them.

His body and her body, his mind and her mind so closely bonded together that it was impossible to tell where one's physical-self began and the other ended. The bond was an overwhelming thing that had taken years to master as it had for every Dragon Master that had made the commitment to bond with another.

He felt his claws, her hands moving now, moving to the sword that was strapped to her back beneath the pack as well as the strong fluent motions of his wings, his own forelimbs tucked tightly against his belly the thick armor plating there a first line of defense against the belly blow. She felt her body soaring and the weight of her own body against her shoulders and knew it to be what he was feeling as she felt the muscles, muscles she did not possess, preparing itself for the swift maneuver that would dislodge any unwanted rider from their body. His neck craned back as she lay her upper body tight against the straining scale, his wings stopped mid motion tucking tightly to his body and they pin wheeled. His enormous body still rushing upwards flew at an arc around his neck and shoulders, she rode the motion with her hips and thighs relaxing as his body drew up parallel to the earth back facing the ground before the rest of his bulk followed the motion of his head and his wings snapped back into motion. Now they were plummeting down, falling faster and faster urged on by his wings at a dead dive perpendicular with the ground and their start off point hurtling faster than their three opponents could react to directly down at them.

The wind howled and the blade whistled sharply through the air as the bird thing and its rider screamed, burning in the gout of flame that erupted from his mouth, their mouth. The second bird creature was caught between four fingered talons crushing the man's skull and ripping bloody tunnels into the bird's wings, it's hollow bones snapping against their palms, his palms. All the while as the blade sliced through another wing and the man's leg, the sharpness cutting through flesh like butter even as he leaned down and took a bite out of his now dead prize and the taste of blood filled their mouth. His mouth.

They did not need to watch the man to know that he was done; they could see his leg and his blood as well as a large portion of his mount's wing falling through the air, passed it even as they hurtled like a comet to the ground. Just four hundred feet away he dropped his prize and they watched longingly as it fell onto the ground even as their wings snapped out to stop their fall so abruptly that it jolted her teeth, their teeth, more than their hard landing on the ground. He lowered his head to his meal, their meal, and began to fill his belly as she rubbed his neck watching the place where the men had come at her from. They had made a mistake coming here and maybe she'd made a mistake killing all of them, there was no one to question but they knew that the men would be back.

It seemed as if old enemies were arising, she watched as He consumed the man and took note of the rune tattooed on his throat just beneath his jaw before the bone disappeared in His mouth with a crunching, grinding snapping sound. Old enemies or maybe new ones, it didn't matter, anyone who bore that symbol someone who had to be destroyed for the sake of the continuing lines of the sons Lynch, Kirkland, and Braddock.


	5. Chapter 5

There was a novelty to this that she enjoyed and hated all at once, the terrible year she had spent with nothing but time on her hands had been ended a month in where she took on an intensive training regimen that had made both her and her partners more successful in life. Since then the pleasure of lying around all day was a rare event to the point where the prospect of lounging around the house with nothing in particular scheduled eventually lead to more training. She had to be busy or her mind would wander inexorably to the more embarrassing times in her life.

She remembered concluding their conversation and curling deep against Devyn's side, her head had rested into the hollow just beneath his collar bone and her arm wrapped around his waist she'd fallen asleep with a good portion of her body draped across his stomach and chest. It had been comfortable but she wasn't surprised that she'd woken alone the man was a member of the Slateport Guard and he rose with the sun everyday no matter what time he had gotten in bed. It even worked in other regions where the sun rose at different times; it was one seriously affective alarm clock that most likely had a lot to do with being on a ship for extended periods of time out at sea. When it was hard to tell what time it was, when you were out in international waters and not on a ferry, it was a general rule of thumb that whenever the sun rose was dawn so it was roughly seven thirty in the summer and six thirty in the winter. From there on out it was a complex guesstimation.

Cynthia sat up and stretched, there was a deep pulling of muscles up and down her arms and back that was delicious in its fullness. The vertebra in her spine popped and she shuddered as the feeling worked its way slowly downwards to her lower back where it pulled. The twanging pain tensed every muscle in her body reflexively, the pain wasn't anything like how it had been before but that didn't stop her body from reacting to it like she had slipped the disc before.

Unable to relax the taunt muscles pulled harder against the pain and it released in a loud popping, jarring sound that brought a moan of pleasure to her lips before she could stop it. _"Oh fuck yes."_ Shudders ran up and down her body even as she rolled to stand beside the hammock absently noting that the afghan was gone.

She could see outlines of people through the smoked plate glass sliding door and pushed it open, the scents of breakfast combined to smack her in the face hard. She salivated at the rich odor of coffee, the sweet scent of pancakes, the meaty greasy odor of bacon, and the delicate almost non-existent fragrance of eggs. What was left of her hangover from the night before was aggravated by the unsympathetic loud noises that Momma Alexandria was making.

The older Alexandria was by the shortest person in the kitchen and would stand shoulder to shoulder with Caitlin who only just managed 5'1" in boots although unlike the psychic who let off a vibe of delicacy the older Alexandria bled the essence of the Mother Hen that she really was. She was slight and slender of build like her only child but lacked the muscle tone that anyone would attribute to Devyn's highly active life style, both mother and child had the same strange colored hair that was a subtle mixture of different shades of browns accented highlights of sandy blonde and low lights of a rich coppery color and black. Unlike her child the Valerie's hair was gaining grey at the roots and she had made no move to conceal that fact from people who still had trouble believing that she was as old as she claimed, despite the sea and sun Valerie Alexandria had aged gracefully.

Pleasantly surprised she found Dawn helping cut tomatoes for the omelets and watching the bacon in the pan, focused intently on the cooking lesson she was receiving. There was a happy cooing over the sound of sizzling bacon and her eyes focused on the source, Devyn's "Nipper" must've been in ecstasy. His little Chimchar had been discovered completely by accident and had hatched what could only be described as the very next day landing the young man with a very young Pokémon that was utterly dependent on him for survival, it had bonded with him in a way that only children can with parents and would refuse to go with anyone else, he had thrown a fit yesterday when he'd been told that he couldn't go to the bar with them. He was getting a reward for his patience thought.

David was home and pressing into the tiny creature with large fingers, apparently hitting all the hotspots as he pet the tiny thing if the wriggling and cooing were any indication of his emotion.

She guessed that he must've gotten home sometime early this morning because he still looked rugged from the road and she would've seen him come in if it had been anytime when the sky was dark… so last night and this morning.

David Alexandria sat at the table with his morning paper spread out before him and a cup of coffee at his elbow and one hand working the little monkey's belly with expert care. The patron of the household looked to be all of sixty years old although he was not much older than forty-five or forty-six, his life as a fisherman showed on every visible surface of his body and skin from the wrinkles that mixed in with the laugh lines on his face to the pits and shiny white scars on his arms and hands from innumerable injuries since his boyhood that occurred on ships every day whether it be because of a hook sticking in the skin or the tangling of a net around an arm. His hair had probably at some point in time matched his eyebrows but his head and beard seemed to have at some point deviated from the dark color that they had originally been to an almost orange blonde that happened to men who had been out on the salty seas off of Slateport's Coast for their entire lives, his hair had most likely gone from platinum blonde to brunette and would go right back to the platinum color if things turned out like she suspected that they would.

"Good morning, Cynthia. Head upstairs and get all cleaned up, we'll all sit down for a meal when you're done." which was a polite way of saying, you smell like alcohol go and take a shower and a jab at her from Momma Alexandria.

Papa Alexandria spared her a smile over the top of the coffee mug, a dual which was his way of saying hello and a signal that a Jubilife Coffee was waiting for her when she got down stairs. The shot of liquor whiskey in the cut would wake her up and beat away what was left of her headache after her aspirin dosage. Cynthia headed upstairs.

Cynthia passed the opened door to Devyn's room and draped herself against the door frame watching the twenty-two year old pulling a leather belt through a pair of shorts, her eyes watching the line of thin dark hair that trailed down her would be sibling's lower belly to disappear into an elastic waistband; Devyn had pulled up a shirt that would be called, in some circles, a wife beater up over the majority of the impressively muscled abdomen revealing washboard abs that were maintained meticulous rituals. Some people believed in a strong upper body or lower, the rest of the body was useless unless you had a strong core that was the philosophy that worked for that awkward boy. "I don't really like waking up by myself, you know that."

"Sorry but I've got to go to the contest grounds you know..." Devyn's hands moved up to work the thin hair tie into place, the hair still dark and damp from the shower. "Deliver some important things." Like she didn't know exactly what he was leaving to do at the Contest Grounds but exercising secrecy was crucial and he didn't get confused when he just was vague with everyone.

"It's okay, have a good time." She continued down the hall as he grinned after her returning it as she turned into the bathroom and shut the door with a click. She smelled like alcohol and outdoors, she really needed a shower.

-ooo-

She had been wandering the festival grounds for the last hour and a half and she was liking what she was seeing, what little of it that she could take in at a time that was. The grounds were a flurry of activity outside and the interior of the dome was in just as much, if not more, chaos as individually commissioned artisans worked their craft showing their very best work and advertising to the architects that had come from the other halls across the region and from others. The metal workers and their partners busied making silver and gold ornaments to place in plaques against the walls or hooks for curtains that had yet to be moved into the hall, each piece sanded and honed to perfection with each detail refined to the master's eye. The city had gone all out in their first Bicentennial Contest and the individually owned and run companies all across Slateport had made it a point to compete viciously for the opportunity to decorate the dome.

All sorts of crews in all sorts of garb appeared from places all across the world to fit into place everything from molding to tile to the paint that made up the edges of the rings outside. The festival grounds had been moved to the superdome that had previously been used for sporting events in light of the month long contest where everyone who had what it took to be a Coordinator came to show their stuff. The flurry of activity had begun each day for the last week at dawn's first light and worked well into the evening with the enormous stadium lighting on well past midnight. The sheer amount of work that had gone into this event was, even now before the qualifying rounds, something to be seen and the sight and sound of the men and women here spurred the people competing for the last few slots to work just that much harder.

There was a certain prestige Bicentennial Coordinator Tournament that made everyone do their best and it was good for everyone involved, it showed everyone that there were more options and more combinations that allow for innumerable appeals possible for each and every situation. The problem was that none of the competitors was allowed to see the color scheme for each day, it had to change, and each day something new was added to test the wills and minds of the one hundred and twenty-nine men and women that would be showing what they had each and every day in multiple arenas with the main event held in the Superdome. The rumor buzzing around was that Hoenn's own **Grand Master Rank Trainer** would be overseeing the Battle Round during which there would be new and more complex rules for each of the selected fields.

She was excited to see Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock, when she had fought against Wallace in the winter it had been televised and she wanted to experience the "class room" first hand even if she wasn't battling. She hoped the rumors weren't false.

It was agonizing and nothing had begun yet.

She let her eyes survey the grandstands going up on the far side of the brown dust that was the first of the Arenas, the sheer amount of sparks that the welding teams were throwing off was awe-inspiring which was exactly why she had come here every day to watch the crews work and appreciate the beauty that they brought to bear. She'd watched the tide come in and go out each day she had been in the city too, watched the sun rise and set on the ocean and was pleasantly surprised. She had all sorts of possible combinations running through her head and she had a total of six different appeals she could make in her group's week to show what they had and what would make them stand out enough to stay.

In her mind she saw herself making it to round two which would be the Battle Round in the final week if she made it past each day's cuts, out of forty three people she had to be the last man standing and as long as she wasn't in the same group as Dawn she had a shot. She, Dawn, and May had signed up at the same time and her chances of succeeding would be greatly increased if she didn't have to worry about the ruthless blue haired girl poisoning her drink or something. She had the drive to win and she would do anything to insure that she was the victor, there was something poisonous in Dawn and only since she had started going with Cynthia that it had come to light.

There was something just off about her, something that was fundamentally wrong and she would bet anything that she wasn't wrong. Yes, if she got the chance to make it to the Battle Round and maybe she could win against Dawn by sheer technical knockout, according to useful sources that final round wouldn't be about beauty it would be about power and power was what she had, what she controlled and she liked that she stood at least some of a chance. She had done well the last time that the League was taking challengers and had held her own until she had run across Drake, the dragons were something else to say the very least.

Powerful creatures that succumbed to Ice only if you got in a lucky shot, one she hadn't been able to make. Four battles back to back with some of the more powerful trainers in a region was challenging to say the very least. But she had been training her mind and body for the last five years for this moment, training with her companions and saving her beast appeals for this moment and her chance at the ultimate Coordinator Glory. The Grand Festival Bicentennial Tournament.

The sun overhead was sticking her shirt to her back and she turned to go back inside and found herself staring into excited blue eyes, the brunette in front of her was bouncing up and down in sheer joy. "Oh. Arceus. You. Should. See. This. Guy!" she squealed the last word so high it was a pitch that human ears couldn't even register. "He's so hot! I mean like body of a god gorgeous!" she gushed pulling her friend by the arm outside, dimly she registered that she should've followed the brunette's example and worn bicycle shorts against the heat but sometimes you just have to learn something by yourself.

Her young friend was still simpering over this guy as she pulled her reluctant companion outside the enormous arches that marked the entrance of the festival grounds, "I saw him and was like-" she brought her free hand up and grasped a lock of pale pink hair between her fingers, the sun had done some serious damage on it the summer before and it was looking like the color that the sun had bleached from it wouldn't return any time soon if she kept up her training regimen. The question came a lot, if she had dyed her hair, some people just couldn't believe that the sun had done it but they were people who did not train as she trained with a heart like she had. The natural red tones wouldn't return without her slowing the pace and if she did she would lose momentum and the self-confidence.

The younger woman stopped and pointed a finger enthusiastically over her shoulder, her body set behind her to point her in the right direction; it took her a moment to see the crew unloading the back of a trailer. The muscular back flexed with the movement of a box bigger around than the younger girl. "Solidad you have to admit that he is something beautiful to see."

He had his back to her and it wasn't a loss in the least, he stood there in khaki cargo shorts held in black by a black leather belt wound around narrow hips. The man was long and lean standing head and shoulders over her, or it looked like it from a distance, with slim but strong shoulders and arms, beneath the A-shirt that had been stained in a few places with brilliantly crisp dye. From his hip dangled a carbineer that jangled with more keys than one could count beside the tucked in black t-shirt that he had probably taken off in the heat of the sun. From beneath a black baseball style cap a thick braid of browns fell to the middle of his shoulder blades. "He is good looking."

Solidad's eyes followed the miles of pale bronze skin that covered the toned plains of his body, hands on his hips he leaned down to shout a command to the men unloading the rest of the boxes which looked like pallets of colored silk. As the two women watched a small cinnamon colored monkey scramble up the young man's shorts to dangle from his belt and play with his keys, the Chimchar went unnoticed or ignored by the young man. He turned then, as if drawn by their attentions, and froze every muscle in that body going absolutely still paralyzed in sharp contraction. At first she didn't understand why anyone would do such a thing and was about to turn around and stare at what was obviously some incredibly beautiful woman or ridiculous sight directly behind them when she met his eyes.

It was Valentyne.

She remembered the last time that she had seen him, he had thrown a man out of a window and beaten him senseless in the front yard but then it had been justified. The man had broken into her house while they had been out and were a threat to both her mother and her daughters, he had done what he felt was absolutely necessary to insure that she would be safe from harm. She had seen him bodily throw another man out of a second story window and watched him chase that man into the night but he had come back and apologized profusely.

He offered a wave of a hand and motioned to his crew before moving across the courtyard towards her the motions were similar to how they had always been a predatory but confident gait that made people assume that he thought that he was Arceus' gift to women. He wasn't and he didn't pretend to be either but he was comfortable in his own skin. Apparently May didn't know that if her tense body was any indication and he did look like a barbarian striding confidently to his conquests and she had only seen the very public break up that had occurred.

"Do you know him?" the whisper was soft in her ear and she smiled at that, oh yes she knew Valentyne in just about every sense of the word. She could still feel him there, caught beneath her in awe.

 _She was sure that he had wanted to close his eyes, to shut out the world and just feel what she was invoking inside of him but she was also sure that he wanted to watch. His hands were mobile as if he was afraid to sit them still but he knew what to do with them, strong fingers traced nonsense patterns over her play of muscles in her stomach as he watched her. They moved further down to catch her hips and she purred as he sat up just a little too fast and shifted just a little too much, damn the boy felt good._

"You could say that, don't you remember he's the one who you saw in Verdanturf." She offered weakly.

"The one with the problems with windows?" May hissed back, she flinched at the sound of her friend's voice and the venom in it and she would have offered up some kind of warning but Devyn was just there and she didn't have time to think let alone offer a warning to duck before a fist smashed into his jaw.

 _"You violent two timing bastard!"_ his head moved with the force of her fist but in her heart she knew that he was far more amused with the fact that someone had been stupid enough to lay hands on him than offended or even injured, more bored than outraged.

May thought that maybe it was a bad idea attacking a man like this but it was too late to go back now and even then backing down wasn't in her nature. She brought her fist back to hit him again, throwing her entire body weight into it like her father taught her and the connection rang true but a sharp agonizing pain ripped through her hand the moment she touched his jaw. Yes, she decided that hitting him was a really bad idea.

-ooo-

The Third Kingdom sat quietly in a stark contrast to the previous hours of the day, the attempt had been a crazy one and despite the suicide mission that the men knew that they had been sent on they fought admirably, more admirably then some of her men could boast but you could only ask so much of the people around you. The would be assassins had fought against her even as the shadows began swallowing them whole and the darkness around them came to life, brave men even in the face of absolute failure they struggled to remain alive and that was why she had shooed the beasts away and ordered piers to be lit for them. Despite their vicious attempt to end her life and despite the fact that they were dying they tried all that harder to remain attached to the spark of life and that was the living analogy for the Void. To continue to exist, to fight to exist even when you know nothing could possibly exist in such a place. The undeniable urge to continue existing no matter what had to be sacrificed, that most basic of instincts that people had and the one that could only be circumvented by the will to continue the existence of your offspring.

Survival.

The beautiful nature of all creatures, that inborn thing that no matter how much "civilized" society moved away from the baser nature would continue to remain the same. It was as a part of man as the heart in his chest and the blood running through his veins.

She relaxed into the stone throne on the basement floor of the Third Kingdom beneath the catacombs and necropolis, in which her people dwelled safe from the harshness of the outside world, in a moment of rare lucidity. There were times when the madness swallowed her for months at a time and they seemed to be getting worse and worse though she was learning to control the emptiness inside of her belly. Low and deep the thrumming center of fire that was the spark, the essence, of someone's life there was that place where the Void lived just behind her naval and the pulsations there were changing again for the third time in her life.

It horrified her and called to that damnable curiosity that had evolved with man into that thing that had people investigating strange noises in movies against the better judgment of the reptile brain. The reptile brain did not lie to you and when it told you that being fascinated with a change in your spark was not a good idea from past experience, it was just not a good idea. The first time the spark in her belly had ignited it had brought on the power that had defied what was previously thought possible and made her the Conquest Icon, the hope of the outlying colonies that ruled themselves as independent nations.

The second the spark in her belly had ignited it had sunk deep into a place inside of her that she had not known existed and did not want to be connected to again, it had done more damage than anyone could have previously imagined as it moved through her and made her one of the Holy Half Dead. With it came the madness and with that madness everything changed drastically for the worse and she had sealed herself inside of the Necropolis when she realized that her control was gone, with the onset of her incurable insanity she was declared a true "Alice" and the one that had come closest to becoming the _true Alice._ With that power she had lost the innocence of love in her life and she would give anything to get that back but the spark still burned like a white hot coal in her belly and demanded things of her, bestial things that left marks on her beloved in the morning, marks that upon every meeting she felt the drive to retouch.

Because she was Alice, or as close as anyone had come to being Alice except the _original Alice_ , she could never go home unless she intended to kill her father for the right to just live within The Under and dwell in The Deep. She could however continue to rule the Third Kingdom as she saw fit and never seize her birth right no matter how much the peoples seemed to adore her. It astounded her how people could still adore her and despite the madness that crept up her limbs and threatened to steal her sanity away for good, she had the suspicion that this was only so because the madness had not been her fault not entirely.

Hot blooded emotion ruled what the body and soul of those who dwelled beneath and in a moment she had done what any other may have hesitated in doing. In the grip of desperate fear and overwhelming adoration and fear she had thrown herself at the mercy of the void in the name of the most powerful emotion and not just the feeling. Love was a strange thing without lust but what were feelings without emotion?

In her desperation to save love of her life she'd willingly and knowingly threw herself into the Void and whether or not she existed there for months or years or just a few seconds was unknown. It was a place where nothing mattered and nothing existed, you would scream if you had a mouth and you would cry if you had eyes, you would panic if you had a mind to comprehend such a thing and the absolute nothing of it was mind breaking and at the same peaceful. If all you wanted was a moment for everything to stop, just a moment where there was blackness and peace to get your head right and your life back into order from the chaos then accessing the Void was your only escape.

If you went searching for a consciousness lost within it and tied that consciousness back to the awareness of a body you would subject yourself to the horrors of nonexistence, unknowing, non-sentience, the damnation of both your spark and soul and the curse of continuing to exist.

The absolution of it had been the unhinging of many minds and it had set a spider web of cracks down the barrier that separated her mind from the others. It was likely that the affect that it had on the mind was spawned in the vast emptiness of the Void. It was sometimes referred to as the primordial ooze for a reason, the more skeptical would liken the Void to something called Human Instrumentality, an idea that was begun with a television series and had extended into reality by the fools that called Holon home. The men and women that called Holon home were scientists that had originally utilized the unique magnetic properties of the area to produce waves of electromagnetic energy via a large tower to center to tract the location of Mew. Some claimed that they changed their purpose was changed.

She didn't know about the validity of that statement but it seemed as if the Void was the ultimate goal of Instrumentality, no one was existed singularly in the Void and were merely part of the whole. The whole idea was that Instrumentality the flaws of one would be masked by the strength of others, the creation of a whole different kind of existence. Or that was the idea… the people who claimed this knew next to nothing about her people and so the accusations that were thrown their way were laughed at and disregarded.

Nothing could exist in the Void and though the experimentation with her madness she had found that she could tap the vastness of the Void's power as long as she did not forget that she existed or despaired in the nothingness. Her mistake was that after retrieving the soul and placing it back within the body of her beloved she forgot herself just for a moment, she forgot that which made her and her spark had flickered leaving her with just the portion of her entity that was soul and not spark.

She had been alive but she was not conscious that she was herself and that way that is fundamental to all humans, as a fetus we have this level of awareness without consciousness and therefore have a soul. When the chap realizes that it is not a part of its mother and that in fact mother and self are two separate things then something strange happens.

When you realize that you are "self" and that "self" is different from others you no longer have a soul which is not to say that sentient creatures are soulless you just have another component added to it making your soul into a "spark" which contains the only evidence that you existed. All sentient creatures had a spark that when brought together and accounted for created a whole other level of consciousness that you are not aware of until death which in itself is an expiration date for the spark which doesn't disappear so much as it becomes something else entirely that is still fundamentally the same. When you died you were prepared on some level to exist just as your spark, a consciousness and a force without a physical body that is necessary for a spark to mature within.

However a mature spark could not exist in that place, the soul would be removed and consumed.

That was the concept of the Void.

If anyone could think that such a thing was anything but the truest death one could have then they deserved to fall into that which they worshipped.

The Void, no matter what the slander claimed, was not the deity that those of the Void worshipped but the vision of the exact opposite of what humanity should be.

Though somehow she became the Conquest Icon of the Void, she, Rachel Schulyer Sullivan, had done the impossible and forced the maturity of the spark and remained within flesh connected into a soul and did not die. Finding the fragments of another's soul and gluing them together to place them back into the body of one who fell accidently into the grips of the Boogieman. It was not supposed to be possible and yet it did happen.

"The third ALICE was a little green one, very cute and dear in the wonderland. She charmed people to her every beck and call, she had made a strange green country. This new ALICE was the country's queen, taken over by a distorted dream. She was afraid of losing to death, she would forever rule her country."

How fitting Rachel thought that the song and the story people told was the truth of the Void, she sighed as she felt Winter creeping up inside of her, it seemed as if her lucidity would not last long this time.


	6. Chapter 6

The Spine of the World had provided decent hunting grounds in the past if you knew the habits of all wild game and it seemed as if time hadn't changed it in the years that she had been gone; though if one had the proper eye and patience then any land would yield game with the exception of the heartland of Orre, the game trails provided the quickest routes up and down Mt. Chimney and over the foothills, the forest and steppe that separated the volcano from the Falls.

This time of year the land smelled sweet and the softness of the last few weeks had begun wear away into the lines and angles of summer. She felt no need to return to civilization just yet when and wasn't required to be anywhere for the next six days at the very least, the Bicentennial festivals never started on the assigned date in the entire history of the Dragon's memory. In any case minimalist mentality was the world that she lived in these days so she took it upon herself to return to the wild roots and hike out to the Falls and climb back up onto their shelf allowing him to eat whatever he caught without fear or reprimand by anyone and he deserved it. There are those that do not understand that the meat on their tables belong to the creatures they share it with and the creatures that they intentionally capture as pets or as battling companions.

They cut across the open country of the steppe and she had taken only enough game for herself and established no camp for the treacherous two day journey across the disastrous land far from any route or mapped path that any sane human being would ever take. The route that she had chosen led up to the gentle rolling hills that held a danger that most would never expect, underground springs had eroded away the soft dirt in spring leaving leg shattering holes in their wake when the earth became like bedrock when baked in the summer heat, one misstep would leave you stranded with a broken femur and in between radio towers unable to contact help for days, the help you need within hours to save your life.

Heedless of the danger that every sign for the last four miles had insisted that she was in she maintained a swift clip up the ever increasing incline to the purple shapes of the mountains far ahead of her. This was Lynch land and her grandfather had left her alone at night in this place, taken her away from her bed and left her here for a full year as was customary. Only the strong survived the trials of Lynch land and those who failed were never seen or heard of again though occasionally the bleached white bones of the unfortunate failures were found on wanderings.

Another two days without incident and she had made it to where she intended to be from the beginning, the place she had been called to check out three months ago and just hadn't had time to so much as make a pass in the general direction in all that time. It made her blood run cold to see the remains of a fire not too many days old, maybe three or four on the western edge of the mountains near the tunnel that most travelers used to pass to Rustboro.

 _"Someone is hiking down to your place, Cher."_ her father's words echoed in her skull as she sat forward flat footed on the earth in a low crouch. She should have made time the moment the message had been passed through the channels. Under normal circumstances word that travelled mouth to mouth to mouth was not reliable but the chain moved from clan to clan until it had reached her in Forina, the message had originated with her mother's father in Opelucid.

Their fish never changed size as it moved from person to person which seemed to stun most of the populace. She didn't understand why.

She paused to examine the trees while sifting her fingers through the smoothness of the ashes, savoring the texture and memorizing it, seeking the little pieces of wood that remained charred or not. A specific signature that detonated the heat and the way that it was burned, a fire type she guessed which meant that whoever it was would be easy to find. Tonight they would look overhead and try to find them, something that would be tempting to do now if she wasn't absolutely sure that the Swellow wouldn't have a field day and raise the dead with their noise at seeing a dragon flying during the day and if there wasn't a high chance that the shining gloss of Shannis' scales wouldn't make him easy to see from the ground even with his back to the sun.

Setting up a temporary camp she found a stone large enough to suit her purposes and dug a pit at an angle beneath it carefully she wiggled a tiny flare into the space fitting it in with the head facing the stone she briskly struck the top against the underside of the stone and withdrew her hand as a brilliant red light ignited the hole. By the time she stood she could already see steam rising from the rock as the heat destroyed all impurities, when she got back it would be a nice cherry red and read to be used as a stove.

-ooo-

Escaping the vigilant eyes of one's lover must not be a problem for many people but the assumption is that men and women of a specific age that grew up with a specific value are possessive. This was true of Jayr and while she couldn't really bring herself to blame the upbringing of the First Kingdom she could revolt against her touch the same as a loyal hound revolts against anyone but their erstwhile master. Her introduction to the darkness did not begin with Jayr and Jayr did not possess her heart, in fact by law what Jayr was doing was illegal stealing the property of one she had not fought in even combat and won. The hierarchy of the Void Touched was absolute confusing but their law was not, because she was not one of theirs she was the property of the individual who had claimed her. That individual had not been Jayr.

Technically she had been registered to Winter and Winter alone and the protest that had come up was quickly swallowed alive by the brutality of the battle that had erupted between the two of them. Jayr had been rushed to a hospital and Winter left to claim her prize in a most intimate and relatively exposed way all things considering.

Either of them would like her wandering around the city with the state of the relations between the two: psychics and Those of the Void; being what they were. Jayr because she was a possessive creature and wanted assert dominance and Winter because she was more than certain that the Seconds and Fifths and maybe the Fourths, the rumor had not been proven either way, were targeting her for assassinations.

The city was not the same as the other had been, not quite as quiet as Mauville and no were near as comforting as Fallabor Town but somehow they managed to invoke those memories, memories of a time before time managed to surface in the same intensity as they had been when she had first experienced them. Something completely unknown to psychics, the technical details of a memory being the only thing that could be successfully recalled with any accuracy besides the biting sting of fear, the startling emotions inside of her were enough to wring her heart and tear open the wound that had never really had a chance to so much as scab over.

Jayr had attempted to offer her company but she had refused the polite offer with a vehemence that had startled her as much as it had Jayr, the taller girl was undoubtedly injured but she had most likely sensed something that had not made her press the issue. Without speaking Sundown had fallen in line with her offering the silent comfort she had come to expect from him, she felt a queer emotion that had until that moment not been something that she could have ever imagined as being real.

A surreal experience that she supposed that many teenagers had as they broached the cusp of their maturity and understood just what was expected of them and just how much the world had changed in the eighteen or nineteen years since their birth. They stood on a precipice that threatened to throw all that they had known and would ever know, or so they felt, into a black vastness the likes of which only the infinity of the Universe and human stupidity could ever hope to match. It sped her heart as she tried to capture those moments for only a moment because they would be the only thing that was real to her, the only thing that she could count on as being true and just even if it wasn't.

These were the things that stuck on the hearts of men and women, the only things that could be trusted when the path before you threatened to crumble beneath your feet like the stones of civilizations long since destroyed. Memories that could be triggered by the slightest of things, things that could only be preserved for a short time while they held those things as close to them as loosely as possible because they were afraid they would shatter if they clutched them too tightly.

It was hard and it brought tears to her eyes, why did anyone feel that way. Why does anyone ever feel this way?

Sundown was a comforting figure from her life before; the things that they had endured together had bound them together for the duration of eternity. She wanted to reach for his hand but she knew that if she dared she would shatter the fragility of this state of mind and the panic would creep up on her slowly but surely. They were meant to bear this in silence, suffer unable to reach out to one another… the human condition made to struggle in the ether.

She was a well-respected member of the Psychic society, held in the same esteem as Sabrina of Saffron City and he was a Third. In that heartbeat she feared that if they embraced they would become one and the only one she could bear to entwine together with was her Winter.

No one less than the Leader of the Void, the established ruler would cast down Holen if he so much as stepped out of line and claim all of the world for herself.

In the Hierarchy of the Void there was four kingdoms ruled by five monarchs called for some strange reason that no one ever explained to her ALICE; she didn't know if it was some strange kind of acronym or if there was some kind of significance to ALICE or even if Alice was a real person. It was something that she was not meant to know, something they guarded jealously as a mother guarded her child.

From what they could gather however none of the rulers was the true ALICE at least that's what she had gathered even as they desperately searched for the one that would lead them safely either into or out of the Void, that much was lost in translation. There were four independently governed colonies referred to because of their independence as Kingdoms that had a base in Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, and Sinnoh.

In Kanto they found a home between Saffron and Lavender in the form of a mansion that drifted in and out of existence similar to the Mirage Island in Hoenn that had been converted into a dance club dubbed "The Void"; In Johto they found residence outside Goldenrod in the Ilex Forest a strangely comforting place where they tended the Forest Guardian from time to time; somewhere inside Old Mauville where the extensive underground caverns created by man and the deeper depressions created by nature served as a battleground which they could hold for all eternity; and around somewhere around Jubilife but that had been mainly a rumor that had been neither confirmed nor denied.

Each kingdom gave homage to a different ruler though for different reasons.

The Firsts Kingdom was ruled by a madwoman who slaughtered everything in her way and so she was respected by those who feared for their lives, the Seconds Kingdom was ruled by a man of words and he was quite the poet but he had spun such convincing lies that the people were unable to tell that he had broken into that most precious of sanctuaries and altered their memories and thoughts, the Thirds Kingdom was ruled by a true madwoman who was on a scale from 1 to 10 totally bat shit insane though she ruled fair and just when she could and was respected for decisions made despite the madness, the Fourths Kingdom was ruled by a set of twins who bickered back and forth and never got anything done and they weren't respected at all their people doing as they wished.

There was no Kingdom established in Unova, Alma, Fiore, The Sevii Islands, The Orange Islands, Oblivia, The Southern Islands, Holon, The Ranger Union, Guyana, Lucario Kingdom or Rota which were inhabited at least half the year by bands of pioneer Thirds. However the true seat of their power was in Orre, somewhere beneath the Under and far beneath the Deep where the physical door into the Void resided. A place where no psychic since the beginning of time, since the start of the unending wars, had ever graced the Door into the Darkness.

Her hand reached out for empty air unable to stand it anymore before she remembered that she was with Sundown and he was completely loyal to Charlie and no matter how much he knew she wanted the comfort he would not grab her hand because he was not sure how to go about being affectionate or comforting. The hard life that most of those of the Void lived had done some things to them that made them almost completely socially inept although there are a few that behave normally.

Most of the time Sundown was a functioning member of society but an entire childhood spent amongst those who did not understand trapped on an island full of the bane of the Void's existence, psychics. It wasn't exactly a sense of hatred but a sense of deep betrayal that kept the groups apart from one another and living as they did, most wanted nothing to do with the others although she was trying to build a bridge between the two siblings.

Yes. Siblings.

Many psychics did not understand that their power was so similar that it seemed different, like two different sides of a coin. That was how some things worked; they were so close to one another that they couldn't stand one another and rebelled against the other with all the force in their bodies. It was sad, they were meant to live in harmony and she knew that better than anyone else in the world because she loved one of the Void and had spent many a tour of duty in the mind of her beloved.

There was a hand in hers, fingers twining together to rest in the space created by the other's knuckles, a hand that was large enough to obscure her entire palm but not so large as to hide it inside like Devyn or Erin's hands could. She felt for Sundown but he was no longer there, he was moving away and his distance meant that he had broken off from her some time ago, more than that he had seen Dawn and was curious as to how she was navigating the streets without Cynthia at her side. Frowning to herself she felt for the mind that was attached to the hand and found absolutely nothing, her eyes flew open and she turned her head to stare into sea foam grey eyes that shone with an inner light that she didn't think was possible for the Void.

Her heart fluttered painfully in her chest as she drew closer into the warm body just inches from her, the free arm coming up over her shoulders pressing her into the living furnace that burned beneath pale skin. Sugar brown hair fell into her face as the figure leaned down and pressed soft lips gently against hers and she sighed forgetting for a moment where she was and who she was in favor of living for this moment. It wasn't often that she could see the true mate of her soul and the kiss that they shared was such a stark contrast to the hot passionate emotions that boiled between herself and the other. Though it wasn't her fault and neither of them blamed the other or her for the situation they were in, they gave one another respectable distance and avoided the other when they could.

They were different as night and day, one turbulent and harsh a Firstling who solved everything with fists and raged like a storm on the ocean or a hurricane breaking over land. Dark murky water that refused to stay still, whipped up into white water rapids that cascaded faster and faster downhill with each passing day. And then there was this, this feeling that was her night calm and cool and collected despite the hell that the world had thrust upon her shoulders from birth having been given a poor hand being born of the Void. This was like the pools of water within the caverns beneath Forina, deep and crystal clear, you could see all the way to the bottom as you could see the soul deep within those clear eyes. Her hands clutched almost painfully at her true mate's wishing for the moment never to end, for this break in the storm to last forever but it couldn't be like that.

She had after all discovered both the mate of her soul and mate of her heart during this life time together in one place, one day she would have to abandon her heart in favor of her soul. She would weep for Jayr's inevitable loss.

-ooo-

The night before had yielded no fire and so she continued onto the shelf and began to climb upwards.

She could've asked him for a ride but that would defeat the purpose and so she began to climb, the memories of previous climbs to the place she'd first seen him hurl himself off the mountain side when they were young. Her fingers took a grasp on the protrusions of granite and it was like she was a soldier returning home from war taking ahold of his wife for the first time in three months, the sea polished rocks fit her hands now as they had before and as the wife's hips fit the man's hands. This place was waiting for her like expectant hookers wait on every corner of the major city hiding their flaws and the _burning_.

The first ten feet were slow, the awkward crawl of the child whose just gotten on a bicycle for the first time in ten years and knows the basic function but thinks that they've forgotten how to ride, it was like she'd forgotten how to climb and in that first ten feet she remembered. Arms lift her effortlessly into the sky, feet finding purchase on what to anyone else would see as a shifty patch but was known to her as solid as the mountain itself; tirelessly she continued up to the shelf where he had perched himself looking down at her smugly. She imagined that is the look that men gave women when they stood in the alleys of Slateport, staring down at the woman waiting eagerly for her pay and taking private joy in the fact that this smug prick would be burning soon too.

He eased himself to the edge and peered down at her, long neck stretching down to her in an affectionate gesture, scaly nostrils twitching as he breathed a long puff of hot air down on her face. It was something that dragons did for their fledglings, an acknowledgement of their efforts and the encouragement to continue to achieve. "Okay then, Papa. When I get up there you're in for a surprise, I don't take kindly to that behavior I am older than you are." she half growled playfully under her breath.

Her muscles coiled tight in on one another, the muscles in her forearms and biceps bulging as she braced herself on her toes. For a moment she lost contact completely with the wall hands moving to the only place they would find a hold in a sideways scrambling motion that brought her five feet to her left, then she was up again taking hold of his dangling tail so that he could hoist her up onto the shelf. His nostrils flared again, his head moving around to nudge her shoulder the sharp tip that had been the egg tooth pressing into the place where the sleeveless shirt and flesh met. He had found something, something important that had not been here a year ago. Three round stones piled one on top of another in a small pyramid marking a tomb, she didn't have to dig up whoever was down there, she had a pretty good idea just who it was and how they had gotten there.

-ooo-

Her hand **_hurt_** in a way that she hadn't imagined it could, the crunching burning pain was instantaneous and brought tears unbidden to her eyes. She saw the bones shift and move, watched as her knuckle shifted out of place. Unfortunately for all her effort and the spectacular punch that had ground her attempts at retribution to a screeching halt he didn't even wince at the blow that landed squarely on a flexed jaw. She guessed that trying to a second one had been a bit much but that was the absolute beautify of hindsight, it was 20/20, so you didn't know that you fucked up until it was entirely too late.

One of his hands came up absently and seized her hand in a vice like grip at the wrist turning her palm completely over and staring at it with hollow eyes. "Don't tuck your thumb into your hands, move them underneath or press them to your pointer finger. Bring your punch up from just below the hip and use your core to put power behind it. Another tip hit the tip of the chin or where the neck meets the head or you'll break your hand if they have their jaw clenched if you aim for the middle."

The monkey grinned up at her as if this were a common occurrence, he seemed to know what he was doing and his little companion seemed to know as well, as if strange women he didn't know came up and tried for his jaw all the time. Then again from what she had gathered about him from Solidad it was quite possible that other disgruntled women tried for him, after all hell hath no fury like a woman scorned and if her friend wasn't willing to let loose her scorn on the man who was named Devyn then she would do it for her with all the holy justice in her body. "Do you want me to put it back in place for you?"

Her jaw dropped at his audacity, first he- and then- and he- that _BASTARD!_ "You insufferable little cockroach I should squash you and put the world out of its misery. How anyone like you could -" her voice failed her as the indignation, pain, and fury welled up inside her painting her face with a heat either he didn't care to acknowledge or didn't see as threatening.

"Do you want to hurt your other hand on my jaw? After all I did just dislocate one of your fingers with my chin." the man spoke to her like she was an idiot and she was not an idiot or at least she didn't think that she was. He released her hand and she cradled it to her stomach, carefully pressing it into her skin in an instinctive if not exactly clear gesture of pain. "Do you want me to put it back in place, it will only hurt as long as its sitting to the side of its socket. You've stretched the ligaments and tendons around it and the longer they stay stretched the more you stretch it. It only hurts because it is not supposed to be in that position, put it back into place and it will be instant relief."

He now turned his attention to the almost catatonic red head and pressed the back of his hand against her cheek and the other to her forehead, she was flushed. His eyes shifted upwards examining the trajectory of the sun, making his body into a gnomon and estimating just how long she had been in the sun. Frowning he pulled a hand back and it to May, strange eyes focused intently on her Solidad face as the other pressed back onto her forehead. "Make up your mind we've got to get her out of the sun, the heat doesn't help and I don't think either of you has had any water. Chances are you're not used to living on the coast and as a result don't compensate for the humidity and how fast it dehydrates the body."

"But I don't feel-" Solidad started but a finger pressed to her lips and she stopped mid-sentence.

"I highly doubt that was the chief reason that she's how she is but either way it's not good for her to be outside like this." his eyes swept her face as if looking for something and the oppressive heat that had been building in the back of her mind for the last week began to swell. She had just passed it off as a stress headache but now she wasn't so sure as those misted green eyes focused in on her and the throbbing intensified. "You're sea touched, not a lot but enough. It'll get worse."

The expression on his face didn't change but he chanced a glance as May and she frowned, they were both treating her like she wasn't there. It was annoying. But it made her think, nothing was really wrong with her she was just _sea touched_ whatever that meant, it was probably on the list of words that you only heard in Slateport City. That and the world _commala_ which she wasn't sure was a word but whatever it meant it was used a lot on the pier so she figured that it had something to do with boating or fishing. She wasn't sure which, only sure that it was a word with which she had to get used to, the kind words of her home town lost and the vernacular as foreign to the people here as their vernacular was to her. They all spoke with a burr in their voice that made understanding the dialect hard but she knew that Devyn, was either well-traveled or he was tried very hard to keep Slateport out of his voice. It could've been both.

She heard it slip through once and just once and the accent was as thick as she had ever heard it.

"What the hell is sea touched?" May asked as she watched him guide Solidad away without a backwards glance back to where he had been before he'd come across the court yard. He didn't motion or say for her to follow but she picked up the implied meaning or maybe she didn't want to leave her friend alone, either way she followed his retreating back and silently understood by just looking at him what was wrong with him.

"I've got bottled water in the chilly bin, drink two completely down, the both of you." his voice left no room for discussion as he made his way around the plain white moving truck to an old but functional truck, he hadn't looked so she wasn't sure how he knew that she was behind him.

He opened the door for Solidad and leaned in to clip her into the decrepit old seat, he jimmied the old buckle and it clicked into place with a little work and closed the door. He moved to open the back door and gestured to May, she hurried in and he did the same for her closing the door and sliding across the hood to the driver's side like this was the Dukes of Hazard.

Devyn brought his hand up to retrieve the keys that the little Chimchar had been clinging to his belt the little monkey clung to his wrist and he easily lifted him through the window, he hurried into Solidad's lap and she stroked his fur affectionately, before Devyn climbed into the saddle. The truck roared to life as she learned just what a Chilly Bin was, apparently a chilly bin was what everyone else called a cooler.

She found a host of ice cold water bottles and passed one up to Solidad as the truck stopped beside the crew he had been with, May tried to catch onto what he was saying but the words were difficult to catch in the thick accent and she only managed to get one or two words out of the conversation. He smiled at the thickly set man who patted the hood of the car and nodded at both May and Solidad tipping his hat to her in the gentlemen like fashion of all Slateport men, he too bore the strand symbol she associated with the Guardsmen of all ports everywhere.

There was the sound of a dry bottle crumbling and she looked down to see that she had emptied the bottle, how thirsty had she been?

Quickly she retrieved another and saw Solidad reach to do the same, addressing their driver as he moved the ancient vehicle down roads that she wouldn't have thought that a group of five could walk shoulder to shoulder down with an ease that bespoke years of experience. "Where are we going?"

"Alexandria's where we can get you looked at by the best doctor in the city and set your friend's hand to rights, a bite to eat, real Slateportian cuisine." He smiled at her through the mirror, "If you have an open mind you're going to love it."

"Why did you do what you did Mr. Dislocate A Girl's Fingers on My Jaw?" May snapped referring to the now famous "Window Incident".

"I didn't want to." his voice was soft, far too soft, "For a time after I tried to get ahold of her and I did just once, she insured me that everything was okay and that nothing had happened though from your reaction it seems like I'm missing a chunk of your story and I know that neither you knows everything either to do with this either." there was bitterness in his tone as he spoke now, a bitterness that held a hint of something that was very important to her success in garnering information. Both of the women spoke at once.

"What don't I know?"

"How much do you know about the Original One?"


	7. Chapter 7

When you are Champion people expect for you to make public appearances, encourage children, mind your manners, support the authority of your nation, and set a good example for all trainers all over the world. You are in the spotlight which was what really caused Champions to throw battles intentionally, it got tiring to have such intrusive people bothering you every waking moment of every day. When you were the Champion and your girlfriend couldn't be trusted with your extracurricular activity's code of secrecy so that she most likely isn't where she is supposed to be you are expected to do something about it.

So, Cynthia did what was only natural for someone in such a compromising position, she changed into a well-worn and well-loved pair of jean short shorts, slipped on some sandals and pulled on her work shirt and sat on the porch. In full Alexandria regalia she looked like another young woman employed with the company and sat on the wide porch swing with a copy of the lasted Spring and Winter travels. They were journal entries clipped together by time of year and duration of stay; she had completely bypassed her own section written about her time in the Pokémon Range Nation, which was a sovereign state despite what some people so ignorantly thought.

Instead she went to the ten page recount of Winter in "Winter Country", it might have sounded like a pun of some kind but the foothills and summit of Mt. Coronet was what most people thought of if they could see the beauty of the season. She was enthralled by the breath taking pictures that had been put into the report this was a reason that you were required to take professional photography classes if you wanted to write for them. You could almost forget how dangerous and unpredictable the landscape was. It was a moment of lucidity that had allowed Winter to do this, between the pictures and the vivid text she could close her eyes and see exactly what the enigmatic woman was describing with a clarity that most people could only imagine. A gift had been given to Winter of the Void.

She presence had gathered an audience of small children and relenting she had read out loud for their benefit, showing them all pictures as she told them about similar experiences she had heard about or had herself in different locations all around the world. Their eyes glowed with excitement as she moved on to the recounting of Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock, a name that brought stunned silence to the assembled group of ten or fifteen children, as she took Caitlin D'Arbanville into the very heart of Forina for the rainy season.

The two part article was written by the Dragon Master and the Psychic respectively, each contained different images that seemed to capture the essence of what each was seeing in such a manner that it was evident who had taken what picture. She turned the page and gasped at the perfect image of "him" and Erin, it had to have been taken without Erin knowing because she would never have allowed such a thing likening it to taking a picture of two people in a city. It was a strange experience seeing it, waiting for it to move, she felt like the children before her on the ground. Most had likely never seen a creature of such beauty, of such strength moving with an evident ease through the air as He.

He was a breed of Salamence like no other that she had seen or was likely to see again, he was utterly graceful in the lithe way that no other of his species could manage if they spent centuries practicing. She had seen him and Erin do maneuvers that would have broken the back of any other that tried and sent them plummeting from the sky to crash into the earth where they would never rise again.

His form was caught in backdrop of brilliant green pillars, the rock mostly hidden by the growing veins and bushes woken from their dreaming with the returning heavy rains that made the season unattractive to most tourists. He was in a half roll with one wing that defied logic in its length and angle fully extended and the other tucked in tight to his body, he was leveling out once again but she only knew that because she had seen his particular way of flying first hand. Erin hung at an impossible angle, almost dangling from his neck and almost thrown away completely though she knew from first-hand experience that she was in absolutely no danger from falling when she was like this.

As she read she became more and more entranced by the stories and how the seemed to fill in the gaps made by the other. According to Caitlin the land was beautiful in its utter vitality and according to Erin, who had grown up just on the western most border of Forina in the steppe before Meteor Falls, each year the land woke and grew far more awe-inspiring, " _"-every year is greeted with a new bouquet of flowers the filled in every spectrum of the rainbows that arch between each and every last one of the three thousand two hundred and seventy nine pillars that jut from the ground here."_ "

The exactness of that count as well as a picture of most of the land taken from the near the summit of Mt. Chimney further down then the exact height so the smoke that the volcano billowed was not caught in the picture and the land in early spring was caught in its waking moment. The green valley spread out like the open palm of some glorious titan, the half-grown flora the quickening blood of the titan beating harder and harder against the heart of the land as it woke slowly like those with low blood pressure.

" _"Though there was concern about the last eruption of Mt. Chimney which sent flaming balls of molten rock high into the air and catching the area around it on fire this place has recovered. It is actually because of the volcano and its activity that Forina exists in any case. The pillars were formed originally by the lava which lowered the land that a far more ancient earthquake had partially depressed. The fires that rage here every decade or so are vital to the continued survival of Forina for the future generations, when fires burn that hot and that long it leaves nutrients in the soil which turns the earth black, black earth is rich earth from which the plants here are reborn. That's what Forina means in the language of the civilization that was once housed here "land of rebirth"._ "

The magic of the moment was ruined, "What the hell do you mean that people are trying to kill you!" the indignant shout that came from the truck lumbering up into the driveway made her wince and put down the magazine on the swing next to her eying the unfortunate woman who learned Devyn's not so understandable secret. She wasn't sure that she understood it some days but there were people who were really trying to kill them both for reasons they weren't exactly clear on, it seemed as if whoever it was hadn't found out about the crisis yet.

The children scattered to the wind and she stood up slowly, "Okay, okay that makes sense, you can't tell me. My next question needs an answer though, you said that your parents decided for you-" there was a pause and a loud clicking sound, Devyn must've undid her seat belt in that screaming metal death trap that he called a truck. "Well," a brown head appeared on the other side of the truck at the passenger's side rear door, "Are… are… are you-. I mean can you… how can you have kids? "She hesitated to ask and Cynthia smiled at the second most frequently asked question when someone found out that Devyn was born a hermaphrodite.

"Not really, I got the measles really bad just as puberty was starting so I can't conceive children though if I hadn't I suppose I would be fertile." She watched her friend slide out of the driver's side and look up pointedly at her, no longer speaking to the teenager. "Now are you just going to stand there or are you going to help me? Little Miss over there dislocated some fingers."

The blonde smiled fondly at the exasperated tone and made her way off of the porch, not questioning the situation as it was as she made her way around the pickup to meet the eyes of someone she wasn't sure she would ever meet up close again. The words of the story that both Erin and Caitlin had weaved still captured her conscious attention and her name escaped Cynthia but she was sure that she knew what it was, she didn't have the same problem with names as Devyn or even, Arceus bless him, Sundown. At one of Dawn's competitions she had met the bubbly brunette and apparently the innocent girl crush the poor teenager had developed still hadn't worn off because the look she gave her had yet to change in the slightest.

The name clicked with the hazy smile the brunette gave her, still flushed from the answer to the question that she had gotten from Devyn, "It's a pleasure to see you again, May." She gestured with her hand to the one the girl had cradled against her stomach, "If I can see it please."

"You know this guy," reluctantly the younger girl yielded the wounded fist, she wanted to guard it with her very life if necessary when the probing fingers moved with a slow patience around the thickly swollen area. Her eyes followed Devyn as he all but carried her friend up onto the porch and into the house, it broke her concentration and she cried out painfully almost jerking her hand free as the Champion of Sinnoh probed the area gently.

"I am sorry. Yes, I know Devyn, he is like a sibling that I never had. Come inside so I can get a better look at this, I may not be able to put it back for you, Momma might have to do it." She followed the blonde's guidance into the house frowning at the open display room as they passed through strangely deserted for this time of day before she was ushered into a pleasant kitchen area with its own dining room and breakfast nook settled in cozily.

A woman was standing at the base of a flight of stairs against the far right hand wall looking worriedly up after a set of footsteps that echoed on wood, May took her in from across the room and instantly liked her. She estimated that the woman stood shoulder to shoulder with her which was a far cry from the almost six foot height of the blonde behind her and the man that was obviously her child that stood over six feet tall but just enough to top Cynthia and not much more.

It was nice to be around people that were normal sized and as she examined the woman's face she had to reassess her concepts of gauging ages, she couldn't have been too terribly old with the lack of wrinkles but not to terribly young either the presence of lines. Not the deep lines that came with age or the evidence of years working in the sun like some of the fishermen she had seen here and farmers elsewhere in Hoenn. The lines were smile and laugh lines and the open expression on the older woman's face showed that there was a wealth of emotion in her face that showed to the fullest, this woman would have a horrible poker face because she wore her heart on her sleeve.

Her hair was the same combination of browns and reds and touches of copper and blonde that had graced Devyn's head except the few streaks of grey that were showing at the temples. Eyes a queer pale but icily clear green shone in the brightly lit kitchen area done in shades of Saffron and yellow which brought out the buttercup tones within them. Dressed in a simple white t-shirt and blue jeans she was the image that she imagined for a kind woman or grandmother, Devyn's mother could be anywhere between forty and sixty.

"Momma." Cynthia's soft respectful tone brought both of their heads around, "This girl went and dislocated her fingers punching your Valentyne in the face." She older woman smiled softly at the two of them and gestured to a chair at the table. She sat down at the chair and delicately yielded her fingers for the older woman, her knuckles were enormous and she could clearly see where her middle finger was sitting closer to her pointer than she could remember it being.

"Now then, let's have a look." Soft, warm, small hands took hers as the older woman took a closer look.

-ooo-

There was a strange kind of niggle in the back of her mind as she sat next to her bed waiting for the woman to return to the world of the waking and for the inevitable stream of questions that would possibly ruin whatever strange emotion that linked them together. If this was anything like what Winter felt on a daily basis being separated from her soul mate then Devyn had a new found respect for the older girl and couldn't really blame her for being certifiably batshit on a scale of one to three twenty. She reached up and stroked her chin absently pondering the only thing that separated her physically from most males; she had never been able to grow a beard. It seemed like a strange thing to point out but when she had spare time she pondered the differences and decided that everyone was like her in some way or another and that she was just more honest with herself.

Usually pondering such things were depressing but Solidad hadn't been close to consciousness when she'd taken her upstairs, it seemed as if Devyn had gotten there just in time. The sea had sunk icy fingers into the red head and wasn't going to let go easily, it would be a hard won battle with the fever and delusions that would come with her being touched as she was but she was in the best place for it.

Devyn looked around her room and smiled at the bareness of it, the room showed that she travelled a lot with its strange bareness. The bed was a queen size and sat in the furthest corner from the door just underneath the enormous window that provided an excellent view of the bay and port. There was a rough unfinished wood desk next to the bed and beside that a bookcase filled with all the novels that she had read as a child and the multitude of magazines that she had subscriptions to as well as the ones she wrote articles for.

A door lead to the closet on the other side of the room and a rug sat in the middle of the floor on which the little Nipper sat staring at her with a concerned expression that was quickly fading into the half lidded look of someone who could barely keep their eyes open any longer. He had a basket waiting for him on the nightstand he would crawl into soon and she would tuck him in.

Leaning back she stared up at the ceiling fan with its slow revolutions and fell into the trancelike haze it could induce on someone with a clear mind, in the years since her childhood she had used the fan to fall asleep and without realizing what she was doing her eyelids fell and sleep washed over her.

-ooo-

He was sweating like a whore in church within moments of stepping off of the plane; his eyes had taken in everything that they could as his brain backlogged them for future use in case something that he had seen would prove important in the coming days. Anything and everything could be some important bit of information that could be used in his attempt to cast down the "Champion of Sinnoh" from her position of almost absolute power with the League. It was disgraceful that the title of 'Champion' could be given to someone who was from and lived actively in a different region. It was unheard of until the blonde had arrived and taken his place from him as easily as he could strip away someone's mental defenses. It was an insult to his intelligence and he wouldn't stand for it any longer.

All he had to do was find some evidence that he could use to incriminate her before the League, something that he didn't think that he would have too much of a hard time finding when he caught the glimpse in her mind three years ago about an assassination attempt on her younger brother in Hoenn. While the blood status didn't mean much, a least not to the national government of Hoenn, it had disturbed her enough that she had let her considerable control slip long enough for him to catch the whole conversation as it flashed through her mind and the clear impression of her being screwed into unconsciousness by the Dragon Master.

He wasn't stupid enough to make an attempt on Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock, the entirety of the three clans would be gunning for his head and not even the League could protect him from the undeniable power of dragons, he did have the power to make a move on the group she worked with. He knew from the common reports as well as through the grape vine that her younger brother was a major player in the archeology group that she worked with frequently, he also knew that every sample they had was taken to Lenora of Nacrene City in southeastern Unova. Lenora was protected by the League and the academy of science so breaking into the Museum and taking a peak into what she had been analyzing for the group she was also a member of was completely beyond reason and could possibly prove to be the last mistake he would ever make. Lenora was a big woman who knew how to handle herself and while Hawes might seem to be a timid person with a gentle nature he was a cold blooded bastard who would kill anyone who tried to make a move on his wife or the Museum.

All other such leads were busts: tracking Valentyne Alexandria had proved to be too difficult and if the man had really thrown another out of a second story window then he doubted that he could stand toe to toe with him in a battle of physical prowess and keep his head on his shoulders, Caitlin D'Arbanville was a powerful psychic in her own right and he would get nothing from her that she wouldn't allow him access to with any efforts met with the calm patience of an adult explaining something difficult to a child, Charlie Lyhnnmann lived with that brute Theodore Mattis and he wouldn't subject himself to being in the same room with any of the Void which made prying Aihi NLN or Rachel Schulyer Sullivan for answers far too dangerous, and then there was Aramis Argumn…

His only chance at getting a good look at what was going on with them, a secret that would make them targets for assassination, was the youngest member of the group an upstart seventeen year old Aramis Argumn who they had met while in the Ryouhi Colony doing only Arceus knows what that may have landed in the heap of trouble they were in.

Ryouhi was a continent and country in one far removed from the rest of the established 'League controlled territories rumored to have originally been a settlement for prisoners like Orre had. Like Orre the land had yielded many interesting surprises and the equator continent as it was called became the source of ranching and livestock for most of the known world. Apparently Ryouhi had its own League but very few trainers ever left to seek fame and fortune beyond the borders of their land, something about how the lifestyle there makes it so that people don't want to ever leave and just live their lives as ranchers.

He couldn't understand it but then he was a city boy and if he ever had to earn his way in the world he would find it difficult to do even a day's work of manual labor even with his considerable, if you asked him, ability as a psychic.

Lucian was in luck, finding Aramis wouldn't prove to be a difficult task because the man was the 'Sheriff' of Argumn Bolt Station. At first he had thought the title low praise before the sixteen hour flight to Ryouhi, he had had time to go over what he knew so far and to look into this Aramis person and the colony itself. Argumn Bolt Station was one of the five largest ranches on the entire continent, the Argumn family seeing mostly to the rearing, slaughtering, packaging, and shipping of Mareep all over the world. The man he was looking for was actually Aramis Adleson Argumn Jr. his father Aramis Adleson Argumn Sr. had passed away five years ago in an accident leaving his oldest son to take care of his mother and the ranch as Sheriff.

The picture of him on the internet had been of a young man with broad incredibly muscular shoulders working bare chested in a barn, hammering away at horse shoes with single minded focus and intensity. For a young man he had a commanding appearance but how he fit in with Blue Archeology's skill. After all, Blue Archeology had a black budget with technology that came out of the Lyhnnmann laboratory far before it even was so much as hinted at with the general populace.

Could he be their mule?

Or their handyman?

It was debatable but all in all he wasn't someone to mess around with guessing by the enormous muscles budging and shifting in his forearms and what little he had been able to garner from his reports.

Lucian found the young man as he was leaving the barn and had to bit his lip to keep from making an appreciative sound, the pictures of the Aramis did not do him justice. Darkly tanned from his work black, black hair fell in unruly curls down to his shoulders, tied in a ponytail. Strong, proud, aristocratic features graced his face making him look like the bold creature that he was, refined, beautiful. His entire body seemed to follow the theme of strong cut muscle all the way down to his cowboy boots, it was enjoyable to watch him move.

"Can I help you?" the Sherriff looked him up and down with a look of disgust. "We don't like your kind around here so make it quick, you League people always want something." The venom in his pale brown eyes was enough to make him want to take a step back but he refused to give ground.

"I'm here to ask you about your connection to Blue Archeology." The activity in the young man's brain stopped instantly, his lip curled in disgust and Lucian sighed… this was going to be a lot harder to do than he originally thought that it would be. Caitlin must've taught the boy well.

-ooo-

She giggled at the look on the man's face and pulled herself back from her young friend and progeny, her student was unique in that he had been born with no ability and still he had managed to block someone trained by rigorous, demanding tutors out and call for her help without him noticing. She had been correct when she had thought that Aramis Adleson Argumn Jr. had a very special mind, his progress astounding her more and more as the days grew long and her mind idled on the same trails they always did when she considered Lucian.

The hand in hers tightened and was pulled upwards, a gentle kiss on the back of it drew her attention back to this place on the planet. The Thirdling had the ability to grab her attention without trying. Blinking, associating herself with this landscape and the person before her, Caitlin found herself pressed against the mate of her soul intimately. Without looking physically or mentally she knew exactly what was happening, Winter had found it strange that Dawn had moved past them on the street without seeing them.

 _"Interesting."_ She whispered softly against her lover's lips, _"Should we follow?"_ the answer was obvious, no. There was no time and neither really wanted to… crude in the extreme but if Winter was not worried by it then Caitlin had no reason to be.

-ooo-

Charlie Lyhnnmann frowned at the read out on the screen; the data had been conclusive until just yesterday when the newest sample had been put into the archive. She ran fingers through her hair frustrated mentally recalling what she knew about ancient pokemon and the similar strand of data in the DNA of every living creature, human and pokemon alike, trying to find the connection. Helix, Dome, Old Amber, Root, Claw, Skill, Armor, Cover and Plume; Omantye, Kabuto, Aerodactyle, Lileep, Anorith, Cranidos, Shieldon, Tirtouga, and Archen. And then of course there was Relicanth…

Her head ached as she thought of the connection between them and Volcarona the evidence pointed back in one single direction, there was something there first that became everything else, something that warped and twisted itself to suit its environment so well that it forever changed. But how did one creature, a common ancestor, that had been more than a bacteria or similar being, become the singular basis for all of the world's animals. Plant life was more or less completely unaffected by whatever phenomena had caused the crack in the black earth in the Ryouhi plate.

An event that had been so catastrophic that it had wiped most of the advanced life off of the planet, destroying all but an estimated 1% of living creatures. But what done it, what could have possibly done so much damage that Arceus had to step into the world again to fix-

She cut that train of thought in half before she could entertain it further, there was no way that the divine deity, the Original One, had bothered to come back to solve the problems of one of his previous inventions. The existence of the three parallel worlds and the realms connected to it: including the world of the Unown, the four realms of Dialga, Palkia, Giratina, and of course the home of the Original One. And then there was the evidences against several species of pokemon that belonged to other worlds until they crash landed on the hurtling ball of dirt that they called home.

Vaguely she toyed with the idea of alien species coming and taking over but quickly dismissed that assumption, if that were true than there would be a lot more of them. Logically even if there was an army of Deoxi there would be some sort of resistance that would be evident in the history of the colonies that had formed and yet there was none. When one looked at the fact that Clefairy were used in construction, the workers using their natural tendency to construct aircraft and runways, and their unusual instinct to dance in a ring on nights of the full moon and nights when meteor showers occur as well as the discovery of them around every meteor it was safe to assume that they wanted to get home. The peaceful and sweet creatures were only dangerous when threatened.

Then there was the possibility, in the mind of the conspiracy theorists that the large population of Staryu and Starmie belonged to another planet where they fought with Lunatone and Solrock explaining the distaste of the four creatures for the other party. And then for people who had gotten frustrated and just gave up the whole problem in the easiest way possible: some idiot had waited for the Millennium Comet, found Jirachi and wished for most of the world to die, possibly to exert control over one of the many kingdoms that had existed at the time though many disappeared around the time of the event.

She groaned and leaned back in her chair, this was just a little too much but there had to be a connection somewhere. Somewhere but she didn't know where, the connection just had to exist. It had to exist because if not then Entei wouldn't be so determined to destroy whoever so reached the heart of the mysteries in Ryouhi. The clues that they had gathered as a group, Blue Archeology, had led her to Orre and Ryouhi and then to Hoenn, then to Johto and Kanto from there, Orre again… Unova.

Somewhere.

Sitting forward the young woman's fingers flew over the key and brought up the three dimensional image of her Volcarona, its wings decorated with elegant symbols. She made the choice consciously to ignore her greatest problem for just a little longer, not much but a little. With the help of Cynthia and Caitlin she would be able to put together some interesting things and this time Erin.

The normally stoic dragon master yielded very little to the group besides security and heavy lifting, climbing and taking pictures and the like, mostly doing it because of Cynthia. With her eyes closed she remembered the images that Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock had yielded earlier that spring, the high resolution images had been of a cave that very few people knew existed in Forina, deep underground it showed a crystalline structure. The carvings in the structure depicted a very clear image of a woman and a dragon, the woman and the dragon that was solely responsible for the creation of the three clans and the founding of a powerful nation.

The Legend dated during the Event that left the mark on the plate, one that they had all overlooked mainly because the truth of how the dragon split into three separate entities was the single most guarded secret of the clans Lynch, Kirkland and Braddock. Whatever had caused it had completely destroyed the woman, the soul deep bond between herself and her dragon flinging her into the Void, physically, the loss of its soulmate had split one creature into three. That significant number was there once again, in her mind she rationalized that it was the sun and moon and stars, the earth and sea and sky, Reshiram and Zekrom and Kyurem, birth and life and death, childhood and adulthood and seniority.

Charlie closed her eyes as she remembered the Dragon Spear Pillar, the interior a holy place for the clan Braddock with the history of the son Braddock written clearly on the inside. Comparatively the single most violent of the clans the, the power of fire and the life that was possible because of the sun, the clan had become the wardens of the part of the dragon that sat within the sun. A peaceful, logically, honorable creature that called itself Reshiram. She had wondered, wondered what would happen if the youngest brother Lynch didn't rule over the vicious creature Kyurem.

Kyurem, the Lord of Ice, the soulless and wild predator that took over whatever it wanted and seized in its hands whatever it wanted. They did say that the heart of hell was ice but whatever had happened to Evermillion had been fire, a fire great enough to erupt over the entire world.

She pushed herself back from the desk and scowled at the ground between her feet, Cynthia should know but the whole story had to be spoken from Erin's lips. The Dragon Master was the truest Master, born of all clans, and therefore the keeper of the clan's memory.

Charlie's eyes flicked to the watch on her arm and stood up slowly, it was roughly two hour before they had scheduled the meeting and it would give her time to indulge in her domestic influences. Baking had been a secret joy of hers, it blanked the mind and made her able to contemplate fully contemplate the restless questions in her mind. Any bit of information would help her solve the problem and what was this but a complex field equation?


	8. Chapter 8

She sighed softly, heavily, as she pressed herself against the body leaning against the uneven roughness of the brick wall behind her. It felt good to be in the arms of the monster again, hidden from the eyes of the public by the unerring skill of the creature crouched on a fire escape somewhere high above their heads. Under any other circumstances she would have panicked, the hole in conscious thought created by Dark types had been enough to set her aquiver ten years ago. Her body stretched out against one such hole, her cheek pressed against the soft cotton shirt inhaling the dark spicy scent of her lover.

It was as close to Arceus as it was possible to be to be like this again, to be together without the subtle tones of rage flying between the two people she was irrevocably in love with. The last time they had gotten into a fight she couldn't stop them; they were so intent on slaughtering one another that it had taken the entire Thirdling Kingdom jumping on top of Winter to stop the fight after she had overcome the significantly weaker Jayr and continued to batter the woman into the ground.

Jayr's blood splattered on the stone floors of the under city, broken and twitching on the floor the young woman had been unconscious before she hit the floor, before the second punch had tottered her balance. Jayr was a vicious fighter but there was something inside of Winter so primal and so understated that there was no creature besides maybe Hollis himself who could stand in a ring for a round with Winter. In a fair fight to the death she had no illusions to who would win even if Winter's sanity held out to the end, Winter could erase Jayr's very existence from the face of the planet and that thought was terrifying and at the same time dangerously arousing.

Suddenly unsatisfied with their current position she leaned back to stare directly up to meet the five foot eleven Winter in the eye and smiled hazily. Caitlin stepped back an inch and stood on the solid steel toe of the boots that the darker girl was wearing and wrapped her arms firmly around her neck, she didn't want this to be like last time. With a gentle mental nudge she urged Winter downwards and pressed her lips against the taller woman's, if anyone else had tried that Winter would have thrown them clear across the alley and proceed to turn them into so much red ruin on the sidewalk and casually walk away like nothing had happened.

While there were thousands of people walking around with dressed like Winter trying to play the badass, they would sit and scowl at people and get loud. But Winter was another animal all together, silent and intense the young woman had an aura of violence and absolute power that radiated from her at all times. If Winter were to walk down the street wearing baby pink from head to toe people would clear out of her way like she was a raging dragon and it was that level of danger that drew women to her from all over and even a few men.

She walked with a swagger that was well earned, everyone successful from The Deep did they had earned it with the hard life that they had lived before coming into the outside world, a swagger that made her the object of hatred.

 _"Rachel,"_ she sighed and felt her Rachel relax beneath her, one of her small hand pressing against the heavy muscled glory of the taller woman's abdomen as the shorter woman let the taller take control of the kiss. Caitlin whimpered against Winter's lips as she remembered the last time she had touched Winter like she really wanted to and her body ignited with that memory as clear to her as if she was reliving it again.

 _Caitlin's too blue eyes stared back at her in the floor to ceiling mirror that dominated one wall of the bathroom, they were wide and a little too shiny but other than that there was no difference she could immediately recognize in herself. But then her spectacular photographic memory failed her in that moment, the post haze of sex seemed to compromise her abilities. She quickly and quietly compared it to an image she had consciously recorded of herself before coming to this temple that existed as a monument to the carnal pleasures of the flesh as well as the other decadence in which mankind took as a guilty pleasure and cursed aloud._

 _There was a large difference between the two images besides the expected "I just got laid" aura that hovered around her, though to anyone else it would've been imperceptible but there was no doubt in her mind that Darach would notice because it was his job to notice such insignificant things._

 _She just had the fuck of her life and everyone would know because Darach would tell Daddy all because Jayr liked to leave marks. Sure Jayr wasn't the only one to do such a thing, although, she admitted grudgingly, that while the wild child had stopped marking her neck she missed it. The sensation was too clear and vivid and it set her body aflame like nothing else could._

 _Though because of her continued protests, and the unexplained and completely inhuman possession that dwelled within her as a result of her indication towards the darkness, Jayr had taken to leaving marks in more delicate places. She wasn't sure if her lover was doing it in defiance of the one who truly held claim over Caitlin's heart or because there was a sadist inside of Jayr and not even the best psychologist could figure it out._

 _Hands reached down to such a beautifully horrible flaw working on the instruction of a part of her thought process that ran alongside the subconscious subliminal primal messages that dictated everything those of the Void did. There was a perfect ring of her lover's teeth tight around her right areola where she'd been tortured near to tears for a touch of that wicked tongue on her aching nipple. On another perfect ring of teeth, on the inside of her thigh, it was possible to tell the contours of the woman's hyper extended canines and the exact groove of her molars._

 _And now that she was probing it with gentle fingers she realized that it still hurt and not in the same way it had hurt when it had been pressed into her skin, she would be sore there and most likely have trouble walking correctly. Already it was turning a nasty shade of purple that promised to be one serious bruise that would require an icepack and physical effort not to limp although she could just cut the pain receptors just beneath the skin there to prevent herself from giving a visible tell. While contemplating this change she let her eyes wander down to the asymmetrical bite mark and frowned, there was a hesitation on one side that made the bite uneven as if one side of her jaw was weaker than the other._

 _Caitlin remembered the fight that had ensured just a year ago and scowled softly, when Valeria had set Jayr's jaw there must have been a bone fragment or something there that prevented the musculature around it from returning to regular strength._

 _Funny. She hadn't noticed that before now. It was a flaw._

 _There were further evidences of their physical differences, further proof of two very different natures that collided though they dreamed the same dream. Caitlin allowed her hand to travel south along the line of her body, stopping where the five trails of redness began at the touch of the woman's nails. Those nails had cut a line across her belly careful of her navel, the marks highlighted in the golden pale bronze hairs that lay almost invisible against her pale skin above the place where all of her attention both physical and mental had been focused not long ago._

 _There was a dark shifting in the back of her mind that she equated to the motion of one of the Void near enough for her extra sense to pick up but not so near as to register as anything else but a hole where something should be. It was like finding something you can't see so you have to look for things around it. She dismissed the shifting as just another resident moving past the room to their quarters to retire for the day. The staff did live underneath the club which could very well be the source of the disturbance though she couldn't prove it._

 _Caitlin turned herself around resigning herself to the problems would come her way but only after she had another few go rounds with the demon that called itself Jayrryan. They weren't expecting her home for at least a week because she was_ "easing the tension between psychics and those of the Void" _which was a hollow excuse for why she was really here in the Thirdling Kingdom but it suited the "noble" houses as a reason. Those of the Void were an unusual lot and the hatred between the two groups if natural genetic mutations, nurtured bred and trained, was spawned because those of the Void were physically inclined; the state of pure physical response without any mental interjection or any prior thought process to anything they did. No logic required made them unpredictable and dangerous when they only thought in the abstract, unconscious way that tells you that you need to breathe. Within their mind primal thought and instinct ran thick and deep as black water currents south of Mossdeep or the blood of the sleeping Giants. But there was an advantage to that, no one had a libido like theirs and it had outmatched hers by entire revolutions around the world._

 _The sun was up so there was no doubt in her mind that she would actually have to wake Jayr up to go another round. Her mind touched Jayr's in that instant and she caught a glimpse of the eternal nightmare. The "human" life of Aihi Kuiyhui of Saffron City, who she was before this place, before the nightmares began, wasn't a pleasant thing either especially after Sabrina discovered her inclination and all but killed her in an attempt to run her out of town. Through her efforts Sabrina had succeeded in birthing the most blood thirsty warrior that the Firstling Kingdom outside Lavender Town had seen since Arabella came into power._

 _Running fingers through her hair she left the bathroom and stepped onto the plush black rug covering the granite floor matching the walls of veined gold and rose. She made her way over to the massive shape of the orgy sized bed dominating the center of the room and the sleeping figure there. On the floor, previously unseen, the black ball of fur lift its head from the ground, the thick rings of golden light erupted on its ears and the center of its forehead. The beast settled back down although she could sense the reluctance to do just that, it moved away with a skill and grace that had come with years of practice at its master's orders and nothing else. Even dark type pokemon abhorred a psychic and would attack at the slightest provocation. Caitlin could tell even at this distance that were it not for the fact that it would anger Master the thing would eat her alive or die trying._

 _The bed shifted almost imperceptivity as she sat down and it that instant she felt the change, eyes that were black as starless, moonless night and deep as caverns seemed to puncture deep beneath the skin. Malicious intent penetrated deep into her skin, seeming to reach her heart, and sent shudders down her spine with the same arctic ambivalence as the one they called "Jack Frost". She knew who it was that defiled this inner sanctum as she knew at the moment Jayr dreamed the dream and was gone, gone into a place that no even the finite of death could compare to. All of it was gone: love, peace, harmony, happiness, friendship and courage were absent from this room._

 _She was plunged into an Arctic Ocean in the heart of winter saved from freezing by riotous waves and the sensation stole her breath and burned her lings, tears threatened to well up in her eyes because even awake and at full strength she was at the mercy of Winter's madness. Drawing in a shuddering breath she stood her ground, feet braced apart preparing herself for the inevitable, the more you fought the more the madness liked it. She had to endure and surrender._

 _It took the considerable force of her will not to look blindly in the dark for what she could not see. Calming herself she reminded herself that she was wise to this game and she couldn't allow the panic that boiled beneath the surface overcome her any more then she could find her stalker. In the darkness trying to use her eyes to find the shadow of the demon crouched atop one of the opulent columns that overlooked the central construct of the doom done in tiers was completely useless. Nothing was private here and she'd learned not to care. The only one given any privacy was the true predator, the "Conquest Icon of the Void", was somewhere in this spacious chamber, the living embodiment of the Void who both was and wasn't the true love of her life all at the same time. One who was the Artic wasteland in which nothing can seemingly exist but yet still life existed, one who had fallen into the Void itself but still continued to live. The validation of their purpose, their Saint, their holy deity, the messiah to lead them into the Void: Rachel Schuyler Sullivan._

 _Caitlin smelled of fear and the predator liked that, the predator liked everything about the tiny pale woman below her and at the same time hated her with all the vehemence of the animal soul. The woman was afraid of the dark (every logical creature was afraid of the dark); searching, probing for a hole in reality for where one of the Void existed but there was nothing. She felt the quizzical thoughts that screamed for her to panic or to be patient but neither would serve her well; Winter was the master of patience; the girl might as well be using he vision to stop a grey snowflake in a blizzard._

 _"Can you not see what lies ahead when sun is gone and moon is dead?" an innocent question that burned within the essence of purity though whether Winter was pure good or pure evil remained to be seen. Then everything was cold and distant her senses sweeping her away as velvet liquid shadow move effortlessly down one of the pillars and made its way over to where she was drowning in the smell, sound, and feel of a cold winter's night. Schuyler's words against her skin, not to fight against Winter's will les she excite the beast and fall into the all-consuming madness._

 _For the first time since the accident she saw the Ruler and understood, in the increasing darkness all she could see were two pale silver gems now blazing half crazed surrounded by a wall of black in front of her. a moment of animal terror when she realized she'd been rolled like the junkies in the clubs, pushed so smoothly that not even she, as an exceptional psychic, had noticed the change. And then there was nothing anymore._

 _Only sensations in the dark._

 _Wholly and willingly she submitted._

 **-ooo-**

Sundown let out a low chesty growl as he turned the corner and caught the scent of something that was not supposed to be here, not the fishy odor that came this close to the port but something far most sinister and cruel. If ice had a smell that would be what penetrated his nose, and it was Ice that was somewhere on this crowded street most likely somewhere close to the smell of frying oil at one of the many stands. Slateport was a city where you could eat yourself into excess and have a good time doing it; food was never far away but then neither was trouble or hookers. While he did appreciate what whores did for society he would never sink so low as to touch a prostitute especially if he wanted to spend the night or day in bed with his lady which didn't seem to dissuade them from trying to pick him up. They paraded themselves around the city and some even found it necessary to rub against him as they passed in an attempt to draw his attention, he would have to burn these clothes before returning to Charlie.

He felt a tug at his pants leg and looked down at the creature that had a good portion of the denim in its mouth, as he looked down the four legged thing sat back on his haunches and looked up at him with intelligent sharp eyes. Black tongue lolling out the side of his mouth the dog like thing twitched two high pointed ears back and forth his black nose quivering, heavy jaws hanging open. The little thing had a skull cap design on its forehead that was a kind of parody of a bird's skull that grew had as bone over black fur; two holes appeared in the skull creating an eyebrow like effect. When closed the short dangerous thick muzzle was a spot of almost brilliant orange against the black and two long canines protruded from his mouth at all times. The strange bony protrusions continued on his back, two slashes that covered the entire upper body from side to side leaving a goodly gap between the two ridges and a short triangular shaped tails. Powerful hind quarters were marked with a few scars from the brute's many fights in his time with his back as well as a vertical slash across his chest where he had a run in with some creature that had lead him to Sundown in the first place. The gash reached from his left shoulder to right armpit and crossed over the triangular tip of orange fur that marked the crest of his chest and continued down across his belly. Strong four clawed paws splayed across the ground in front of the brute displaying the last and most unusual set of protrusions that circled around his fore and hind paws close to his equivalent of a wrist joint like handcuffs.

Immediately he greeted his master with a wagging tail, paws up on Sundown's thighs to get closer to the hands that dealt love and punishment. It was a behavior that turned heads, a behavior that exactly mirrored another similar creature, a Growlithe, enough to be unnerving but it wasn't an act.

Some people claimed to have domesticated them but the truth was that there was no domesticating the creatures of the Void, you just got them to comply with your will by pressing upon them your own will. The only thing that was keeping him and Charlie together, she was a strong willed woman that would lay into him with whatever she thought was necessary to get him to comply with her wishes but gave enough for him to understand that she loved him. It was just the nature of their relationship and the lay out of every relationship that was successful in the real world or at least in his mind.

However it was this train of thought that made him convinced that Jayr was a less than appropriate choice for a mate for Caitlin, it was very clear that Jayr was in control at all times which meant that her will was always being exerted and Caitlin never had a chance to be dominant. Not that it was necessarily a bad thing because if the noises that he heard and things that he had seen made him believe that she liked being dominated but there was insecurity over the claim that Jayr had over her. Winter was an animal, a true animal that played nice in public and bent to Caitlin's will whenever the blonde wanted her too and it suited her. That was how you knew that it was love, how Sundown knew that the brute adored him, despite the fact that people were convinced that anything of the Void was evil and incapable of love.

They were wrong.

The brute truly loved Sundown and deferred to him as leader and father in that strange way that domesticated canines have with their "owners", when he came he was happy to serve in exchange for the sensation he was receiving now, fingers messaging the roots of his ears setting him aquiver with pleasure. Sundown gently pushed his shoulder and he obediently let his paws fall to the ground and looked up at his master, instantly ready to go to work.

Despite his looks, he was a smart little bastard as all his kind were and he had found what he had been sent looking for and as such willingly submitted to being collared, one of his kind running around through back alleys was not a problem, one of his kind walking around on the streets would draw attention. Dark types were considered to be evil and therefore unlucky in the eyes of the masses especially if they were wild. His dog was a wild animal through and through and the only reason why the brute even listened to him was because they had friended one another during an unusual portion of his life when they both had needed someone, they had created a two man pack and he was the leader. Looping the black leather around the dog's neck he allowed the dark creature to pull him winding through the streets until the overpowering scent in his nose was enough to make him nauseous.

Though mercifully the beast halted his pace and stopped nosing towards the building across the street and panting loudly. "You sure she went in there?" Sundown half whispered to it despite the roar of the street. The brute simply turned and nodded once, sharply, the affirmative. He trusted that knowledge, after all, the little bastard was smart and they had been together too much for him to try anything stupid. "Alright then," he smiled, "Let's return and take council with Charlie." At the mention of her name the brute's tail set to wagging to hard that his entire rear shook with enthusiasm, he liked that quality in the beast for a reason. She would have some idea as to what Dawn was doing here with Ice of all people that was something other than what he suspected, or at least he hoped so.

 **-ooo-**

The sun had set below the horizon as he tipped a wing and brought them down in a tight downwards spiral that kept all four of his feet level with the ground and allowed for his head to come around to defend himself if absolutely necessary. Twice more they had been attacked by the men on those bird things and twice more they had killed the entire band of them without thinking of questioning any of the men, it saddened her but at the same time allowed for humor to bubble in the back of her mind.

Whoever was in charge, surely everyone she had met had been cannon fodder, was persistent to send not one but three squads to their deaths at the hands of a dragon and his rider, the last unfortunate man had become a meal along with the bird like creature as they passed over Forina and Mt. Chimney. The calories had filled him up and that had actually taken time off their original estimation for how long it would take to get to the city, because of this they chose to wing around heading out to sea towards Pacificlog before turning back northwest coming in a large circle out at sea to the house off the coast which she had been informed would be the official meeting place for this strange occasion.

An unusual request but Erin assumed it was intentional and Caitlin was trying to give her time to put together the pieces of an abstract puzzle before presenting what she had a hold of to them. Insofar what she had gathered had been decidedly little, the men didn't have much in the way of fighting skills or flying skills for that matter which compared to her didn't mean much. Every Dragon Rider could fight from the back of a dragon as well as they could on the ground and fly from anywhere, even the tail which had come in handy several times over the last few hours. The advantage of being slung through the air over the head of your enemy's mount to get at him directly while the mount was busy trying to avoid a ravenous dragon was more than just marginal and besides- who would really think that someone would come catapulting off of a dragon's tail.

In the end she had only pieced three things together, poorly, by the time the lights from the coast came back into focus from her observations and radically different manner of reasoning. Which meant little but maybe Caitlin could put it to Blue Archeology better or, if they were lucky, Winter.

From what she had gathered from Caitlin who had contacted her somewhere between Lavaridge and Mauville in the midafternoon informing her of the happenings so far within the city and more importantly informing her that Winter seemed extremely lucid which was great in its own way, the way that the psychic had posed it made it seem as if the madness was coming to an end if such a thing was possible but you could always hope. More importantly they would be discussing the matter that came up between Charlie and herself shortly after the expedition to the Whirl Islands and more importantly what they had found in the Relic Castle and the Ruin Valley on their vacation on the Sevii Islands.

Such things would only be discussed under very particular conditions which included all of their number present with the exception of Devyn, who was having woman issues according to Cynthia. Erin was of a strong mind to remind Cynthia that they had their own problems to work out but would hold it off until such a time when it wouldn't be obstructive and damaging to the dynamics of the group. Couple's therapy would do nothing for the two of them they just needed to sit down and talk it out.

Back on topic the problem with Devyn was pressing, Valentyne was an invaluable member of the team with some of the best experience with translating the hieroglyphs of numerous civilizations and a good eye for detail. Without his help they could over look something. And while the information could be relayed in real time to Devyn with the help of Caitlin's Musharna the transmission had proved to hamper that excellent eye.

The real time display of information over vast distances almost was enough to make her envious of the psychic but with what Caitlin had to endure as a child to get those powers under control was enough to make the Dragon Master certain that she had gotten off relatively easy despite how hard her grandfather had pushed her and Lance.

And with Caitlin becoming a member of the Elite Four at fourteen and for the previous thirteen years having no real control to harness and unleash your power was a feat that Erin could appreciate even if she could only just comprehend what psychics did to "train" themselves and their minds to keep other minds from theirs when they wanted no one's thoughts in their head except their own. _"Having no one else's thoughts in your head except your own."_ She thought quietly feeling the low rumble of Shan away from her thoughts like distant thunder on the horizon.

The concept was as foreign to her as living a life without him in her head, without him beside her, the breaking of such a connection would undoubtedly kill her spiritually if not physically. Maybe that was what it was like for psychics all the time with all their powers except it wasn't just one person it was everyone that they were around. That helped her get her head around the thoughts.

Wings stretched taunt his feet skimmed the grass and he came down eyes still searching the skies, with a gentle thump. His wings stretched to their limits out from his body with the bony fingers stretching as far from one another as possible, the vertebrae in his back popped and shifted beneath her body and she slid to the ground. Spine arching like a cat he stretched from wing tip to wing tip, nose to tail, flexing powerful claws and digits in the ground. The human equivalent of a full body stretch and the closest thing you could get for a dragon, his wings snapped into his body so fast with a noise like a sheet flapped in the wind that it was almost as if they had never been stretched to the limits just seconds before.

His huge scaly head came around to press the tip of his snout gently against her forehead, asking in his subtle language if she was okay to which the response was the same as his, "A little stiff but nothing a good stretch won't fix." He snorted a puff of hot air onto her face and turned his attention back to the villa on this beautiful stretch of coast, the windows brightly illuminated a beacon for them to follow.

She was off of his back and on the grass with a sound like whispering wind through tall grasses, her tall form moving with a grace born from years and years of practicing. A nudge to his shoulder with the whole of her body and they were off walking again, headed towards the light and the sound and the debate that would be coming up soon. Reaching out she pressed hard against the "doorway" between herself and Caitlin alerting the psychic to her presence as well as checking the time, Devyn had an hour and Sundown wasn't back yet though Aramis was on his way he would be teleporting in at the last minute so that someone couldn't follow him.

The last confused her, the explanation had something to do with ley lines and resetting of time at midnight which was why clocks went back to one and something about an hour that normal humans never experienced and something else. Jibberish in short.

A bubbling of golden warmth, Caitlin was laughing at her.

 _"You are simplistic in your views on the world around you still Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock."_ The words in her head formed clearly in her native tongue.

 _"Da, the world is simple. The world is a thing like dragons, things happen for a reason and everything that an animal does can be explained by simple logic. Humans are the only ones that make thing complicated, hunger means eat, exhaustion means sleep, an ache means relief, an enemy means kill, and movement means travel. Psychic cut down on things by having energy move them that, is entirely too much like work to try and figure out so I ignore it. If it's not simple then don't do it."_ She felt the relief and satisfaction in Caitlin that she was the same as ever and Erin fought against showing Caitlin that the people around them that were unsatisfied with their life were the ones that changed.

Hiding emotions was something that she had become adept at, masking them as something else to prevent them from leaking over to your companion was something that all Riders were taught but Erin had been able to make herself a neutral entity as plain and unenticing as the color beige. If Shan couldn't pry apart her shields and see inside than Caitlin stood no chance.

Pushing the psychic away she focused on what was important, the problems she had faced and the connection to Devyn's "anger fit" three years ago. A part of her wished that everyone could be present for this meeting, it was imperative that everyone that was involved was here or at least in her mind she felt this was what it should be but the other part knew that if Devyn had any idea of what she suspected then it would result in them coming to blows. Hurting Devyn would make Cynthia angry and for some reason she didn't want to name Erin didn't want Cynthia mad at her.

This conversation was going to go on well past dawn and would take a turn for the darkest soon enough of that she was sure, sure as the rain that would fall lightly tomorrow afternoon around lunch time, sure as she was that a time of great challenges and tests was lying in wait for them just around the corner, just out of sight.

 _"How are you so sure that this will continue to go on?"_ the masculine growl belonged to her companion and she turned her head to look at him in one white glittering eye, the pupil focusing and refocusing on her and her close proximity to him.

 _"Just a feeling, a feeling like what I had when I saw the shadow at Lacunosa Town."_ He didn't say anything in response and just rumbled in agreement, he had seen it as well but only for a second before they had been under attack. A blacker shadow against the ground and a sound like nothing he had ever heard before something terrifying and cold sliding into his mind as ice thick as the polar caps formed on the walls of the city.

He had woken up curled around Erin tightly to keep her warm with the fire in his belly the next morning and they had never spoken of it again, after that experience ten years ago the two of them had trusted the gut instinct that came to Erin and it had kept them alive too many times to count. So he nodded and silently hoped that this wouldn't end up like every other time Erin had felt something odd on the horizon, it never boded well for man flesh that wasn't hers or her allies'.


	9. Chapter 9

Sundown trotted merrily down the road without a single care in the world, his mind utterly focused on nothing and wandering to the more abstract topics that were the greater questions of man. Like why science couldn't explain why the shower curtains move inwards when you took a hot shower, though he reasoned that it was cooler air moving to a warmer area although heat rose-. The pointlessness of the mental argument could be pushed over into Charlie but the woman he loved was a knot of nerves right now and he didn't want to be on the receiving end of that anger any more than he wanted to be the object on which Winter based her frustrations.

His thoughts of Winter made him remember a simpler time before his friend absolutely lost her mind, the time before they had left the safety of the Deep and the comfort of the Under in Orre. Rachel had never so much as went to visit although he knew that Blaylock was pinning to see his daughter again the woman remained stubbornly resolute or ignorant of his summonses. But when one played a game with the thrones of darkness one had two choices: win or die. Already this year there had been thirteen attempts on Winter's life all Firstlings ordered by the Dragon ruler of the Firstlings, the only reason the vile bitch was alive was because if Winter were to kill her then Jayr would be ruler and have the power to petition the other kingdoms for the removal of Caitlin on the bases of madness.

"Then Winter would call Erin and Erin would bring Shannis and I would go with them and we would slaughter anyone and everyone who got in our way." He reasoned out loud, by no stretch of the imagination was he an innocent man but he didn't relish slaughter like Alexii and preferred a quieter life in which to indulge in decadence.

There was a whisper of fabric in the wind which his keen ears picked up, his eyes automatically dilating to half of maximum capacity as Sundown turned his head to smile down the street behind him. It had been a nice night and he had taken a detour through the park that would take longer but put him out closer to Caitlin's villa, the brute at his heels needed to be walked in any case so he didn't take to worrying his teeth together instead of tearing at the furniture.

At first he had assumed muggers but quickly dismissed that thought when he took in the black on deep green in trees, no one seemed to take into account that those of the Void could see color in absolute darkness. An adaption resulting from years of living in underground mining facilities and the cities that now sat where mines had failed for generations. He didn't think they were psychic but he did assume that they were of the same kind that had come after Winter the fourteenth time, he hadn't gotten a good look at those men because Winter had jumped them into the floor and entombed them in the bright room beneath. The bright room was a form of punishment, there were no doors and no shadows anywhere in the bricked up prison cell, the only way in was to be jumped from above and the only way out was to be pulled from below. As curious as he was sitting in a true self-examination room did not appeal to him on any level.

Quickly and quietly he stepped out of the light cast by the street lamp and dipped into the inkiness of the world around him, stuck his little finger into the void and pulled himself into the null space between them. Instantly the world changed and his perception of the world altered to fit the new reality that was around him, everything was in muted shades in a dull grey light at high noon and the black of the darkest forest at night. Objects that were solid on the side of reality that he was born to were solid here but water was dangerous and somewhat solid for what he could make of it.

Never had he been tempted to try his hand at swimming, water linked directly to the Void under the best of circumstances.

Sundown strode through the open air towards his would be attackers casually, his mind reaching out to see if anyone else had jumped themselves and could only sense on the far edge of his perception Widow in a web of energy that was the Thirdling Kingdom. Reassured of his safety, not even Blaylock or Winter could hide themselves here, he took three quick steps and was amongst the four men before any had realized that he had "disappeared".

As the first cries of alarm erupted from them he was back on the physical plane of existence with the nine inch blade he carried in his boot dug deeply into the underside of one of the men's jaw and far into his palate. He fell dead amongst is fellows as the sickening crunch and wail of electrical equipment met his ears a ringing sound of his upper hand. They had had some kind of machine that produced intense light, or so he assumed, and the brute had found it and destroyed it for his friend and master's sake.

That snarling ball of black fur came up and caught another of the three remaining in the throat and pulled him to the ground, thick claws digging at his delicate belly and chest like they were made of tissue paper. The third went down with a vicious blow to his temple, the thin bones snapping underneath the force of Sundown's fist. The fourth made a valiant effort to fight the young man that had appeared so suddenly amongst them, regaining his senses slowly but regaining them regardless.

Sundown danced just outside the bounds of the man's knife, conscious of the position of the blade in relation to his skin. The man was decent, skilled even but as Sundown slapped knife in his hand away and buried that wicked thin blade between the man's ribs a hand moving to cover whatever sound that the dying man would make the superior experience and skill made itself known.

Laying down the only man that fought on the ground and closed his eyes softly with two fingers of his left hand whispering a prayer for the dead. "I think that I should hasten on my way." holding out a hand to his brute Sundown reached out and once more dipped into the space between physical and nothingness where nothing unexpected could come upon him without his notice.

-ooo-

How much heartache can a single question yield?

The answer was an astronomical amount, _"Has anyone seen Dawn?"_ the color drained from the brunette teenager's face and Valerie's boy had rushed to get her a chair. With shaking hands and shoulders the story of the things that had been seen, the places that the other had gone, the oddness of it all so surreal. The final evidence that anyone needed for Cynthia to finally do something about the one that had taken her away from the better relationship.

Valerie spared a glance at her baby and smiled at the tight expression written across his fine features, when he worried he reminded her so much of his father that it made her heart squeeze painfully in her chest. All her life had been focused into making one night of drunken weakness into the pride of her existence, the mark she would leave on this world when she left. Yes, her Valentyne had been an accident the likes of which had made her family disown her and walk out of her life forever regardless of the marriage and the beautiful baby boy that had become the apple of his father's eye.

Her son looked at the door to the gallery and sunroom fixated on something that she couldn't and wouldn't be able to see, the young man sat with his chin resting on a bridge of his fingers elbows on the table. She wanted to prod at him, remind him that it was bad manners, but let him doubting that her son would be able to hear her in the state that he was in. The nuisance batch that he was working himself into would be something fierce, a trait shared by all Alexandria men, she feared for that little girl that his agitation would be released upon if he didn't explode at Cynthia.

For all her regal stature and the prestige of being Champion she was still a girl, in her twenties but a girl thrust into the limelight in such a way that left her bitterly exposed, and had made the mistake of a girl in love. She hadn't seen what was sitting directly in front of her and now they were all in danger because of it, Valentyne scratched his chin and leaned back slowly. His hands moving to rest of his thighs, back pressed hard into the wooden chair, feet braced a part.

"Have I ever led you astray?" he asked softly as Valerie took a seat next to the down trodden blonde, taking the younger girl's hand in hers for support, "Have I ever told you something that was meant to hurt you in some way?" her Valentyne was trying to soften the blow that was coming as best as he could but nothing would make it feel like anything but hurricane storm force taken directly to the chest.

"No, Valentyne, you haven't." Valerie soothed her thumb over the back of her daughter's palm, nodding at him to continue, the gravity of Cynthia actually using his given name and not the nicknames of 'Devyn' or 'Dev'.

"You need to tell Dawn that she needs to disappear, go somewhere and hide for the rest of her unnatural life." His eyes ignited with the volatility of his fury, more horrible because it was cold as winter ice grown thick over a stagnant bay. "I can control myself in this matter; however I severely doubt that Erin can."

Which was true as far as Valerie could tell from her few meetings with the Dragon Master. Polite enough of a girl but there was a feral lethality that lurked beneath the surface of her skin that was awe-inspiring to see, if she were to sum up what she had seen of Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock in one word it would be 'intense'. The fact that she would dice the young teenager into pieces like she was chopped meat was a given, while she had not really experienced the whole of what Erin had to offer she had no problem seeing the black haired woman killing Dawn slowly with a kitchen knife.

Valerie's eyes flickered to the block on the counter across from them; she was having a hard time not wanting to take the chicken scissors housed there into to the girl herself.

Shaking herself against that thought she watched her baby as he relaxed his shoulders, exhaling slowly, counting to ten in his head as he did when he was angry so he didn't snap at someone. Turning his attention to the brunette sitting beside him he offered a smile with a good natured expression on his face reaching his eyes, "May, are you absolutely sure that you saw Dawn talking to Ash?"

May stiffened and he reached out a hand to take both of hers where they twisted together on the table, she shrunk in on itself like a small prey animal hiding from a predator knowing that it had been seen. His hand closed over both of hers softly and she jumped in her seat nodding furiously as if that would make this whole unpleasant business easier, "This is really important, I need you to answer as well as you can. I'm not going to ask you to do anything but remember what he was wearing earlier today. Okay?" he waited patiently as she digested those words and nodded again. "Was Ash wearing a grey badge or star?"

Cynthia tensed and Valerie's hand went slack around the younger woman's as the girl nodded again, her son brought the younger girl's hand up to his lips and pressed a kiss to her knuckles. "I'm sorry." He said soothingly as he could.

If Ash Ketchum was involved with _them_ then they might have some previously unseen problems that could prove to be fatal. After his spectacular loss to Cynthia after she had reclaimed a bit of herself, with Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock if what Valerie's intuition was correct, he had gone underground. His supposed skills had failed him in the last few moments and his lack of knowledge and his blind lust for the place of Champion and Master had pulled the wool over his eyes so that the Mareep could shock him. The young man was annihilated within three minutes of the match starting; the jump start that Cynthia had gotten revived the tenacious spirit and the heart of the master within. Ash in his ignorance didn't stand a chance and should have been honored that the second place contender for Grand Master had taken the time out of her day to pop him a good one like everyone else in the world.

He hadn't been, instead Ash Ketchum had fallen into the delusion that somehow Arceus had conspired against him and changed his tactics up completely, heading to Orre of all places to challenge the coliseums there and hopefully regain some of his fame. He did not succeed, his failure in the Deep was a career crushing one, and in his impatience he had called the monster out of the darkness. Hayden the illustrious master of the blackness had spun around him a web of despair so thick that the crowd had drowned in it, the man had crushed Ash Ketchum into the dirt and left him there like the worm he was.

Twice defeated in such a sound way and once injured by an attack placed intentionally on his person the young man slunk away into the darkness to lick his wounds and try again. Gone from the public eye for the better part of two years no one had been able to find him, not even his mother until he contacted Dawn. Dawn who then entered into a relationship with the first person to beat him soundly about the ears with a slipper, things were looking bad for everyone involved. Whatever he had planned with _them_ it didn't bode well for anyone who so much as lived too near the blast zone and people would be packed into Slateport as tight as Magikarp running in the fall. Like a tsunami racing to the shoreline it would break over everyone in this country and either they would stand strong or drown under the onslaught.

Silently Valerie wondered about her baby's safety but ceased that train of thought the moment that she began to blame Cynthia in her heart for just an instant. If they were interested in Valentyne it was because of his connections to archeology which had begun with Cynthia's fascination with the world that had passed from the surface of recent human memory. The connection with Blue Archeology kept her boy lithe and spry kept his mind racing and insured that he would stay on his toes in matters of the body and mind as much as navigating the ocean. He had come to love it and grow closer to his sister and she wouldn't begrudge her daughter that, a ball of ice settled in her belly for each of the members of the crew.

Charlie Lyhnnmann was a good kid with a heart of gold even if she was just a little bit too much of a smart-ass from time to time Charlie had sat up with Valerie on more than one occasion arguing philosophy and ethics with her. Actually using her degree and exploring her interest with someone who could really give her an intellectual challenge that she could meet without fearing hurting, as much as she loved her son she couldn't argue with someone she had taught herself.

Theodore Mattis was an interesting and charming young man that was always willing to lend a hand wherever it was needed, a boy that seemed to have been born to a very chivalrous father who taught him to behave like a man even if he did insist that she call him Sundown like everyone else. She was one of the few people who actually knew why he preferred Sundown to Theodore or Teddy.

Caitlin D'Arbanville had a beautiful soul and a delicate kind of build and health that prevented her from traveling as much as she liked, the young woman was still as cheerful as sunshine and unfailingly well-mannered in a way that wasn't as fake as the rest of the League's aristocracy. An interesting conversation over Sunday afternoon lemonade and ice tea on the back porch especially if Charlie decided to join them and not run out with the boys.

Aramis Argumn the consummate country boy with a heart of gold full of "Yessum" and "Noma'am", a keen shot with an air soft rifle from the back porch. He treated everything delicate as china, a man who was shy and adorable. Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock and Rachel Schuyler Sullivan the wild cards, feral and dangerous but contained like the more exotic of creatures that people close to live with, sometimes curling up on your lap and other times ripping your face off. And finally Aihi or just Jayr with no last name, the silent figure was intimidating but kind in a way that imitated Rachel and Erin but didn't quite reach.

All of them had sat laughing and arguing in her kitchen before and she didn't want to see any of them hurt for any reason, especially not for a passion of theirs as innocent as archeology but they must have found something. That was the only reason- her attention snapped back to the room as Valentyne stood slowly from the table, eyes focused intently on the stairs. He looked back at Cynthia and had the expression of a man torn between saving his wife and his child from death with both of them crying for him to save them from certain dead.

"Go on, Erin will be here to pick us up with Shan in fifty minutes or so." The blonde's voice was tired as she dismissed her brother, "This may be the last time in a long time you get to talk to her freely depending on what our sources have gathered. We may have to go underground." Without a backwards glance he went and was up the stairs in an instant.

-ooo-

There was a delicious warmth and heat settled over her back as she slowly came back into the world of the living, it should have alarmed her but set her mind instantly to rest. It was the weight of a man and not the indistinct weight and pressure of the girls curling up to her on cooler nights or when one of them, most likely Legna, had a nightmare and wanted comfort. The man went behind her felt right; his body spooning her tightly against the toned planes of his chest and stomach, his large hands wrapped around her waist one cupping her left hip.

"Go back to sleep, I want to hold you a little while longer." He rasped softly, head moving down to press a kiss against her shoulder. With that sweet gesture she knew exactly who he was for certain and exactly where she was.

"How long was I asleep?" she asked, remembering seeing Devyn from across the opened courtyard of the festival grounds and remembered feeling off in a way that she couldn't get her finger on, remembered coming home with Devyn and having his mother feed her some kind of broth that made her immensely tired.

"A few hours, the sun is down now." Stretching against him she purred at the sensation and turned in his arms to face him, her lips pressing to the underside of his jaw where just the slightest amount of fuzz was beginning to make itself known. "Are you feeling better?"

"Mmmm," the noise was affirmative and almost involuntary as she took in the warmth of his skin and the musk of a man who behaved as a man should. "A lot better." Solidad pressed herself against him, feeling his body prepare itself for her, a new heat and heaviness pressing firmly against her lower belly.

Her hands moved up to cup his cheeks and pull his head down, her tongue tracing a line over his lip playfully before her caught her in a kiss that set her on fire. His hand moved to her hips and caught them before she could settle into the rolling grinding of her hips that she knew drove him insane, he pulled back and buried his face into her hair. "As much as I would like to continue where this is leading, my mother is downstairs and my father is across the hall from us. If you want to continue they will hear us."

Well if that wasn't the ultimate mood killer than nothing was, who would've thought that you would get twat-swatted by your one-time boyfriend and now soul mate? Not Solidad. "Damn." She groaned low in her throat in disappointment.

"How are the girls?" he asked softly settling himself in deeper, falling into a place in the mattress that was seemed to be contoured to fit his body directly.

"Sarah is still a little monster in the making, I find myself telling her mother I'm sorry for what I put her through. Legna misses you so much it's almost unreal." It went unspoken that he missed the twins too, they had mutually adored each other and Solidad had imagined him as their father. Tucking them into bed and taking them to school, teaching them to be good people that accepted everyone in life despite their differences.

How she wished that this man had been the father of her children, the first man in their lives that they had as a steady presence and a positive influence. Sure her brother visited when he had the chance but that wasn't too often, they were close and he called often but he had left for Holon the moment that he was able too. His fascination with Mew and the relation between science and nature had been as strong a calling in him as being a coordinator was for her.

But it had been Devyn that had shown them the things that a father would show his daughters, had shown them that there was nothing to be afraid of in a baby Zigzagoon newly hatched earlier in the week. His legs that her shy little Legna had hidden behind from a Marill that had terrified her when all it had wanted to do was play, his arms that Sarah had run to too show her art project, his voice that had comforted them both during one particularly nasty lightning storm. Arceus if things were different, if only it was him instead of that monster.

He had lived with them for almost a year before the men came after him; the only thing that he was obligated to return to was a P.O. Box in Slateport and his mother and father for one major holiday every year. She rolled to look up at him, one of his hands moving to rest comfortably on her thigh the other sliding around her waist. "When will it be safe again?"

"If I only knew." Her fingers tangled tightly in his shirt, "If I have to go underground, I'm going to come and get you and the girls." His voice resolute and firm, his mind already made up. "I won't have anyone ruin this world for them, no one will go after them so long as I still breathe."

-ooo-

Her hand tightened around her lovers as the taller of the two led her further into a crowded street, venders pushing their wares on the tourists and locals alike. The city had gone all out for the festival and goods ranging from fake badges to foods to hookers three streets over were packed into the commercial district for the two week-long event.

Anyone who knew even the slightest thing about Caitlin D'Arbanville knew that she did not like crowds despite being a member of the Unova League and despite being the overseer of the Battle Palace, people made her nervous. Being in large crowds made her remember the days before she had managed to ride herd on her abilities and was exposed and raw to the emotions and thoughts of others. Sometimes she still accidently slipped but not with her lover's hand in hers. Rachel was a cool touch stone that eased her back into her own skin so that she wasn't so far unattached to the rest of the real world.

Something had caught Rachel's attention and removed them from their very lovely position to a very uncomfortable position brushing shoulders with people who just weren't fast enough to get out of the obviously radio in your car, radiating outwards like some angry beast that made people move away without thinking about it consciously but she'd toned it down for their journey across the city so that the crowd wouldn't watch her leave. It made for slower going but it put whatever had gotten her lover's attention further behind them.

Without looking she knew well that her lover was reaching out for a place to jump, enough shadow to straddle the lines and pull Caitlin with her. Jumping across for Rachel was a thing that was absolutely second nature, it was rumored but unconfirmed that Rachel could jump in broad daylight but that was as of yet unconfirmed. Caitlin was sure that if she asked she would get her answer but wasn't sure what she wanted to answer to be so instead she took to keeping as close as humanly possible to Rachel as she could be without breaking their relentless pace.

Abruptly though Rachel stopped and whirled around so fast that she was a blur of black, the command came clearly through the doorway between their minds, _"Down."_

Caitlin found her body moving before she even heard it clearly, her knees bent beneath the sweeping arm, the hand that held hers tightened and the one that latched onto the man was strong enough to splinter bone. Her perception of the world changed around so abruptly that it took her breath away, twisting and warping in on itself until she had to close her eyes. It was like standing up too quick or like being lightheaded and turning around too fast and then she was falling.

Tumbling end over end into an abyss although she could still feel her feet securely placed against the ground the world she was now in was wrong, so utterly wrong and she was terrified. Nausea swelled inside her belly and her eyes pressed tighter together, it was like drowning in black and weightlessness. A weight settled in her stomach that helped her find a grounding point in this world so strange and yet so vivid, Rachel hadn't brought her here Winter had.

Winter was awake and doing something unfailingly horrible to the man that she had grabbed and then the world she knew was back. Reality seemed to snap back like a rubber band on a wrist and she was back, her feet securely on the uneven cobbles worn mostly smooth by the passage of hundreds of feet. Arms like steel bands wrapped around her waist holding her mostly upright pressed tightly against a body she knew just as well as her own but inhabited by a creature born in that black nothingness that they had just escaped.

 _"I'm so sorry baby, I didn't think."_ Lips pressed gently against her temple and she knew that Rachel was back, the words that remained unspoken were that Winter had almost let Caitlin fall into that emptiness where they had left the man. _"I am."_ and Caitlin knew it as well as she did her own name, it had not been intentional, that man was dangerous and Winter had reacted to protect them both.

Head hands moved up to tangle in Rachel's hair, venerating in the silkiness of that pale brown, she gently urged her soul mate downward so she could meet cerulean to sea foam. "I know. Now please take us back." Steel slammed into those eyes and that overpowering need to protect shone clearly turning that translucent color luminous.

"Not until you're safe as I would dictate." Safe as Rachel would dictate was a place where a combination of herself, Erin, Sundown, and Jayr would be. The more of the better but bare minimum was two. Safe as Winter would dictate would be Orre, in the Deep beneath the Under, or if that was completely out of the question, which it was, then the catacombs and Necropolis of the Thirdling Kingdom was acceptable.

Worse was there was absolutely no arguing with either of the two beings that occupied the body of her beloved, no matter how much you tried. Keeping in mind that this was the only argument that she got in with her lover that she lost Caitlin contented herself with the knowledge passed from every father to his son before the day of his wedding, _"You're wife is always right and no matter what you're always right. So protect her with everything you have."_

Strange, two months ago she would've blanched at the thought of considering anyone as a partner in her life for eternity male or female, Rachel or Jayr but now… Caitlin relaxed into that embrace and dropped her head more comfortably against her lover's chest inhaling the dark rich scent of her skin.

But now, things were different. She all but felt the liquid power rushing through the being against her like it was within her own body, Caitlin felt Rachel reach out into the abyss and pull at the very fabric of the world they were standing in. Then there was a pinch, not so much a sensation of being pinched but of pinching something very fine and very delicate like a sand dollar between two fingers and drawing it up slowly to eye level. Balance and tenderness were required as much as the sight to find that exact place on the beach where the perfect little circular disc lay.

Rachel held that pinched bit of reality between two fingers and stepped over the gathering as gentle as a sleeping child's breath and Caitlin knew that what they had done was teleported from one place to another. A strange technique, completely foreign to her but not so much out of her range of experience that she didn't recognize it for what it was. Not so much so out of character for both of those distinct personalities that she wasn't aware of just who was holding her tenderly now as the stars snapped into place in the heavens and the warm scent of the sea breeze teased her nostrils.


	10. Chapter 10

Fire is a mysterious element both revered and feared throughout the world.

The man's fingers moved in precise, practiced patterns across the floor spreading the thick, tar-like substance across the ground to complete the intricate, interlocking circular formation. He understood clearly, that what he was doing would irritate a lot of people in a lot of high places but it seemed as if it didn't matter anymore. Nothing matters anymore except the surface, he had to disturb the surface to get to what he wanted underneath and that meant fire, which meant that everyone who defied his lord and master had to suffer indirectly and then directly.

The sea sprayed up in all directions as he continued to mark the bow of the boat with letters that only the people the message was for would understand a threat and demand all in one swoop. He didn't worry about failure because his part was almost over, his part in his master's rise to power would end here on this boat roaring into Slateport's Bay gunning for the ship arriving with the first load of coordinators for the Bicentennial Grand Festival, the fools wouldn't even know what it them but then again he wasn't too sure that he knew what extent that the man he served would go to for his sense of justice.

He closed his eyes and remembered the wrong done onto him all those years ago, the hatred that burned in his belly for the freaks and all those who sided with him. That hatred had made him susceptible and easily manipulated, everyone said so and while he knew it he also knew that he didn't care as long as he got revenge on them. The man had assured him that this would strike them good, get to the heart of their kingdom and if he survived he would get to take the heart of the one who did him wrong all those years ago.

Just thinking about it made his ass sore; he could hear the screaming woman he had attacked and the low bass growl of the man's voice in his ear as he tied his hands securely around his waist. _"So you think that you're a rapist huh, boy? Well let's see how much you like it, let's see if you've got the stones to take back what you've given."_ He hadn't been able to sit down after the man tore through him, ruined him, and stuck a TM Case up his ass for good measure. He snarled at the memory and hated himself for getting hard, the thought of being dominated, the thought that someone out there had gotten the better of him in the worse possible way made his cock throb deliciously.

He wanted revenge alright but he also wanted to feel that again, humiliation in such a way made him humble. Made him believe in his quest for success, made him believe that he was really alive and that he in some way was no better than anyone else; his head was getting big again in light of his recent successes both serving his master and his personal achievements, he might never be a master but that didn't matter so long as he continued to win. This was one battle that he had to win, win or cease living, he heard the boat's engines roar as it put on the last bit of acceleration and looked down at the bottle that had started it all.

While he had promised that he would go to his AA meetings he never did, alcohol had just been a gateway to other things like drugs and violence and rape and eventually this… murder. He shut his eyes as he remembered his last punishment for failure, his woman had been brutalized as he was beaten until he couldn't take another step, until he couldn't crawl to her defense or raise his hands in his own. He wasn't sure if he even wanted this anymore or if this was just him trying his hardest so this would never happen again, either way he couldn't forgive any of them… ever.

His eyes moved to the pistol stowed in the bottom of the cooler beside him and he patted the top, it would make his next job easier than it would have been if he was supposed to make it look like an accident. Making accidents kill people is harder than it seems regardless of what the movies portray, you would think with super powered monsters running around it would be easier but for some reason it just wasn't. Putting a round in Steven Stone's head would be easier than taking the time to fake a gas leak or something like that; he was going to be the victim of a mugging gone wrong.

Afterwards all he would have to do was light the symbol and watch the masses panic. It was bad luck for the Rescue Squadrons and the Guardsmen to cross paths and the superstitious Slateport Guard would most likely thing that the Forest or Desert Rescue were to blame. The two groups were at a cease fire but the war between them still raged.

The only way that _they_ could operate was in absolute chaos and to start a mess here would bring on a shit storm from the local authorities but it might be enough to distract them from what he was trying to accomplish. Steven was just a distraction; it was all just a distraction.

Whatever the others had planned was a relatively negligible point all he wanted to do was prove that he was the best that had ever been and no one, not even the League could stand a chance against him. He was simply the best that had ever been or would ever be.

-ooo-

In one smooth, controlled motion he brought the Remington Model 597 up to his shoulder and fired once at the onrushing monstrosity. The explosive crack of the bullet echoed in his ears at what seemed like the same time as the monster exploded like a water balloon filled with pudding dropped from a fifth story window. He brought and scanned the entrance to the cabins below deck ignoring the whispers of the civilians at his back and the hole he had blasted in the deck.

Most of the men he worked with on a regular basis preferred using .22LR Ammunition for work like this: close quarters with a high chance of taking each other out with friendly fire. But there was the chance that you would have to fire twice if you missed and less of a chance of putting a hole straight through the hull and slowly sinking whichever girl you happened to be on at the time. Devyn, like his father kneeling four feet behind him and just off to the left, preferred using .17 HMR hollow points when dealing with Jellicent on ships because it popped the bastards on contact. The more powerful ammunition was considered by many to be too expensive and too powerful at such a close range for taking down such relatively small game.

He looked at the jelly left splattered around the hole in the polished wood and decided that the advantages far outweighed the disadvantages. Mentally he ticked off the amount of ammunition left in the cartridge, six, and proceeded through the door and down the stairs. Eyes alert to whatever danger might be lurking in the darkness, you could never be sure just how many of these things came to shore at a time.

The news had come in sometime around three that morning when one of the Watchers at the Eastern Edge Lighthouse had radioed in with the horrifying news that a cloud of Jellicent had swarmed a boat that had been running with its navigation lights out. The only reason they had seen it at all was because the old piece of gristle Jaska had experience finding the dangers of the depths and had caught onto the Jellicent flashing purple and blue lights beneath the surface before they attacked. Needless to say that the boat had crashed into the rocks underneath the lighthouse and exploded but the information they needed was spread to each of the guardhouses in the city.

With the innumerous people flooding into the city every day by land, sea and air it was imperative that they dealt with this situation quickly and effectively. The siren had gone off just minutes after Jaska had flagged the boat and the message had been sent out by the Watchers, everyone was to wake up and abandon the docks for the relative safety of the shore and the guardhouses. After rounding up only the most stall worthy of the Captains and ship hands that had offered their assistance dealing with this potentially deadly situation the Slateport Guardsmen had begun sweeping the docks and surrounding waters around them.

Devyn hadn't made it onto the scene until five o'clock but they had had to wait until five thirty for those who hadn't been on duty to arrive and gear up, shortly after the preformed teams divided the civilians up amongst them and set out to clean shop. At eight o'clock now they were only half of the way done and Devyn's team had racked up an impressive one hundred sightings and seventy-four kills. It could have very well been seventy-four kill sightings and seventy-four kills because it was impossible to tell one you had seen before hovering somewhere out of range or in a place for a bad shot and one you had just shot.

Up ahead he could see a T-intersection and mentally Devyn cursed, "Biron. Two corners." His voice was rock steady as he focused all of his senses on the ship around him and could feel when the man behind him tense for action as the otterdog at the brown haired man's hip flattened itself to the ground and poked just his nose past the edge of the wall.

The orange furred creature instantly shot into the T-intersection, marking a harsh sound of challenge like a crazed thing. The yellow collar around his neck inflating in a display of his dominance and power, the blue fins on each forelimb fluttering back and forth in an almost mechanical threatening way, the otterdog's brave and fearless nature displaying itself.

Biron was one of the squad of Buizel that the Slateport Guard had trained specifically for sniffing out and rounding up Jellicent in closed quarters. While they did have a teams of Vaporeon, Dewott, Marshtomp, Tombre, and Bibarel with various levels of success despite the reported success from other Guardsmen the very obedient and people pleasing Buizel had made themselves famous in Slateport. That orange body launched itself immediately to the left and Devyn threw himself into the intersection already shouting the command to Birons, "OUT!"

The rifle came up and his eyes registered the horror of the creature standing floor to ceiling in the hallway before him. The blue pale stood tall on three thick tentacles marked with icy blue diamonds, two larger clover like tentacles preoccupied with keeping otterdog away from its face, red eyes filled with hatred and malice. The Jellicent's mustache like adornment on his face flushed purple in its anger, the crown like adornment flashed again and again with that strange purple light.

All those tiny details came to him in the instant before the .17 HMR tore through its body. Those eyes turned to him for just an instant before its body rippled like water a stone had been thrown into, filled with surprise. It's "hands" stopped fighting with otterdog who was already backing down the hallways barking like mad. _"It must've thought it had hold of a devil…"_ Devyn though before the ripples reached the hole that bullet had left and its body no longer able to maintain the pressure needed to remain solid burst into a thousand tiny pieces.

Five bullets left in the cartridge. "Find."

Birons took off like a world class sprinter, turning a sharp right and slamming into the door to the first cabin with enough force to crack the wood beneath the paint as the door flew open. The door slammed against the inside of the room and swung shut again as Devyn reached it, without breaking stride he kicked open, "OUT!" He saw the flash of a tentacle coming straight for him, pink this time meaning that it was a female, and he pulled the trigger. Heart racing in his chest as if it meant to escape it the young man counted again.

Four bullets let in the cartridge.

The otterdog was squatting before him, rubbing his nose against Devyn's leg beneath the Kevlar, polyethylene blend of the pants to his armor. Devyn reached down and rubbed Rodney's head affectionately, the sound of a single shot fired somewhere behind him turned both of their heads.

"Alright Birons," the brown haired man said slowly, turning to look at the pale faced teenaged boy standing in the doorway. "Find."

-ooo-

"You don't want to see her." The statement chilled something in the very core of her soul, hardened it, straightened her back and tensed her muscles. Arguing with the woman would be like arguing with a brick wall if end up with her unconscious and bleeding with the high possibility of broken bones.

Her heart told her that Erin wouldn't hurt her, not intentionally but her head replayed the facts as they were, Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock was a stone cold killer and had been since early childhood. She had been raised to be a Dragon Master, the leader of all three of the major clans and fighting her would be like trying to wrestle a dragon and if she wanted to die there were less painful ways to commit suicide. Her head told her that Erin wouldn't hesitate to kill her if it came down to it even as her heart screamed that Erin would mourn her loss. But that didn't mean that the larger woman wouldn't pop her neck like she was an unfortunate Unfezant that had strayed too close.

"Yes, I do." There was a flash of something undecipherable in Erin's eyes, something that must have some kind of cognizant thought that would have made Caitlin turn around and run back to the kitchen where the sun was shining and Charlie was making omelets. Fortunately Cynthia did not have the same abilities as Caitlin and it saved her from whatever they were hiding in the basement, the screams hadn't stopped until around six in the morning. "I feel-"

"Obligated to say goodbye, I know." Erin opened the door that she had been leaning on and beckoned her into the dimly lit staircase that would take her down into the darkness. At first glance it seemed like a cliché, the typical torture chamber that fit every stereotype that you had ever seen in a movie until she saw the shadows move. That, was not typical unless you were in one of those movies where being harassed by demons was the norm.

Well if you wanted to get technical people did call the Void touched demons and they did live in massive underground necropolises that usually featured architecture from the gothic era. If you wanted to get technical that is and being technical meant that she would draw back up memories of the rumors surrounding Winter.

She stepped onto the first stair almost expecting it to creak beneath her feet even knowing that the place was new and that all the stairs would be secured properly or Caitlin's father would have a fit when he inspected the place. That was one of the benefits of spastic parents she supposed, they did unusual things that made what they were doing look even worse by comparison. They were on two different kinds of insane and immoral and they were far on the side that gets you thrown into triple max slams where you'll never see the light of day.

Halfway down she could see the edges of a blue tarp, the absence of a large pool of blood meant that they hadn't removed a limb the hard way, with power tools and let her bleed to death. But that didn't rule out the possibility of welding a finger off or something equally as horrible, they very well could have gotten nails and drilled them into her knees for all Cynthia knew. She didn't know a lot because she didn't join the dream team when things got bad and they needed information that could potentially save lives, didn't like to be around the people they did horrible things too. Except that one time, just once when she had thought that she could handle it… Erin had picked her up and walked away from the tent with her and seeing what they had done to the boy the next morning had reinforced how unready she was to join the party away from the camp. Sundown didn't like rapists, showed them exactly what it felt like apparently though whether or not her enjoyed it she was afraid to ask.

She sincerely hoped that Sundown hadn't raped Dawn. That was worse than she deserved for her betrayal.

At the bottom of the stairs she paused and stared blankly the black haired teenager duct taped to one of those aluminum folding chairs that seemed to be ever present in public buildings. With her arms taped to her sides and her torso taped to the chair she couldn't see any physical damage besides the swollen left side of her face where Sundown had punched her to knock her out to they could bring her here. Tears streamed down her face and she was whispering something over and over again, shaking her head fiercely.

Winter crouched down before the girl and cupped her chin in one hand, Dawn shrieked and tried to pull away but the relentless vice like grip prevented her from doing anything but insuring that she would bruise more post mortem if anyone found a body. No one ever found the bodies. Eyes swallowed by black turned to observe the blonde neutrally; utterly passive as they waited for her to do whatever it was that she had come to do.

"Nothing will spare her life?" she asked but she already knew the answer.

"Her mind is already gone; dropping her into the Void is a small mercy. She will forget herself; forget what I have convinced her that I have done to her." Dawn flailed as best she could in the chair, "I have taken a white hot piece of metal and taken her eyes, I have taken a pair of tinsnips and her fingers joint by joint, I have taken her limbs and fed them to Sholto piece by piece, I have skinned her alive and fed the strips of flesh to her, to kill her is a mercy."

Cynthia's eyes snapped back to the mostly unharmed Dawn and marveled for a moment at the horrors that could be inflicted by someone's own mind. If it was true, if Winter had really done what she said and had broken Dawn's mind- "It would be a mercy." She whispered mostly to herself.

"You could say goodbye though your words would not reach her, Cynthia Stendahl." She shook her head slowly, if there was no point then why should she bother?

"She deserves no mercy, Winter." Winter's hand tightened viciously around Dawn's jaw, Cynthia reached out without being told and flicked the light switch throwing the basement into darkness saved for the cracks around the door at the top of the stairs. She squeezed her eyes shut, she didn't want to see the darker shapes move. Dawn didn't make a sound as the darkness within the darkness opened its maw and swallowed her whole. Wherever Winter had put Dawn it could be assured that whatever awaited her would be extremely unpleasant, they might be kind enough to put her mind back together for her only to have her convinced that nothing was wrong and she hadn't been found out.

Whatever happened from here on out wasn't her problem anymore. She was done with Dawn. With a strange sort of calmness she turned and felt her way back up the stairs to the door and rapped twice, it opened just enough for her to squeeze through and walk numbly to the kitchen. Heavier footsteps fall behind her but she doesn't need to look to know that it Erin, to know that it's the black haired woman's way of saying _"I told you you don't want to see her."_ But the 'I told you so' game wasn't in the Dragon Master's nature so she kept her mouth closed. So she just didn't speak, words were unnecessary.

-ooo-

This city is a melting pot.

Damned if she didn't hate those words and the inaccuracies that were placed upon the city because people were not smart enough to realize that nothing within Slateport even resembled a melting pot. It might have been the years she had spent tending the forge, the years she had devoted to being a true Gow and the effort that went into every blow until every time she hit the metal it sung that brought up the true distaste of the words. For whatever reason she had gathered up every pamphlet and leaflet that were to be strewn across the contest grounds and stands today and gotten out a red permanent marker.

The solid block of red on each informational panel was anything but inconspicuous but that wasn't the point. The words fruit salad were written neatly above the block, each part of the city was in itself individual and distinct mixing together to create a very unique flavor not a combination of cultures so intertwined that it was impossible to tell one from another. The inaccuracy bugged her like losing a scale bugged Shan which was to say thoroughly and infinitely.

It could have been that she had visited places that were literally like a melting pot, so many things so thoroughly mixed together that it was impossible to tell what metal you had started with. Jubilife was the perfect example, a bastardization of what the world was supposed to be, like these ridiculous contests. Ridiculous contests that demanded that she be present on the contest grounds before noon even though the opening ceremony wasn't for another two days and even though every Coordinator was signing in and didn't need an official referee for any arguments that they got into. It was all public relations, they wanted the Coordinators to be comfortable around the people who would be judging them or keeping the alive for the duration of the Contest.

Despite the obvious attention she garnered from the crowd of people signing in on the far end of the covered tent no one had bothered her yet today. Maybe they knew about the fifteen foot long scaly reptile that had curled itself into a ball and lay dozing in the warmth behind her, maybe it was because they weren't used to seeing Erin doing anything but battling, maybe it was the tattoos they were unnerving.

In fact the League had wanted her to have them removed until Drake had explained in as many small words as he could that removing them would cast great shame onto all three clans and onto Erin herself. When they had suggested that Erin keep them covered at all times they had been greeted with indignation and a jab at Lance's pride. He did whatever he could to cover his to make himself fit the image that the League wanted to portray. Covering them was like covering all the artwork in the churches devoted to Arceus, blasphemy. In the end they had let her keep the menacing looking things only after they had agreed to let her yield her position as Champion to Steven Stone for reasons of her own.

That had been a screaming match to outdo every other meeting of the United Leagues of the world. Retiring or passing the position of Champion on wasn't as uncommon as people seemed to think but under normal circumstances the person who yielded the position gave the League a reason for it and hadn't just been named Champion.

Erin really didn't have patience for the rules, the system was flawed and the less control they had over her the better.

"Oh my! You're Erin! Aren't you?" she looked up and raised an ebony eyebrow at the man standing in front of her all but drooling, he was supposed to be some hot shot coordinator but all she could see was an idiot dressed up as a Cacturne.

"Who wants to know?" she took in the purple hair and sharp green eyes and the absolutely ridiculous outfit that had a diamond cut out so that his bellybutton and the piercing there would show.

"Harley, your biggest fan!" he gushed and closed in to within inches of the table. "And Slateport's sure-win competitor. After all I am the native son."

"Okay Harley," she recapped the pen and sat back, placing her hands palm down on the table in front of her in a gesture that she had developed that kept her from coming over the top of the table and smacking the foolishness right out of the man. "You do realize that the usual judges for Contests won't be here right? I mean Mr. Contesta and Mr. Sukizo won't have anything to do with this contest, they won't touch it was a fifty foot long pole. As for you being the native son no one from Slateport is judging the appeals for more than one day and this is a week long event."

He looked down trodden but his eyes instantly lit up again. "Hey, aren't you a judge?" he asked as if wasn't common knowledge that the 'legendary' Grand Master of Hoenn wasn't supposed to be here smiling and happy and encouraging all the while looking powerful and indomitable all the while trying to look approachable by the public. It was just some public relations stunt to make her look more approachable, she wasn't so stupid as to believe it was anything else.

"Incorrect, Harley." She said softly, "I am here to make sure that the battles do not get so far out of hand that the city catches fire and to ensure that no one dies or is killed in battle." The last words were incredibly soft but the threat behind the words was menacing.

Shannis chose at that exact moment to raise his head, the massive triangular shaped jaws on the brute opening and expelling a huff of smoke over the man who hastily stepped backwards as if that would save him if Shannis got angry with him. If Harley really was her biggest fan then he knew what happened on Mt. Battle and the controversy that had sparked because of the incident.

It was common knowledge that it was illegal for any individual to have a captured pokemon before the age of eight if they were in school but most children received their first when they were ten. It was also relatively common knowledge that the Dragon Master clans had a certain infinity with dragons because they were normally paired with a dragon by the age of six. What was world news because of its sheer oddity was that Erin Lynch Kirkland Braddock had gotten Shannis to hatch for her at the age of two when she'd first touched his egg.

By the time that Erin had turned ten she and Shannis, fully grown and fully evolved, had set out on their adventure without him owing her anything and their bond being friendship. True ownership over Shannis hadn't been questioned until her last stand on Mt. Battle for the title of the very best in the entire world wherein her opponent had actually tried to capture the dragon. He had responded with roasting then man alive at the command of Erin. After being dragged back before the League Erin had explained in a way that when competing in Orre that killing your opponent wasn't against the law, it was just frowned upon by the general public.

There were other rumors that Erin had killed other people with the help of the dragon but that had been the only one.

Harley set his jaw and took another step forward, "Does this mean that the rest of us can see dream team in action?" maybe there was steel in him somewhere or stupidity. Erin's hands twitched with the urge to reach out and make him stop talking but the necessity of appearing calm and controlled so that the Hoenn League would appear as one united front against all those who would oppose League rules stopped her. She didn't want to have to fight that battle yet.

"Ah, dream team. Is that what you call it?" she asked, each word enunciated properly and carefully, mindful of her accent and the storm brewing in her belly."

"Shannis," he pointed to the dragon still staring impassively at him, his voice strong and certain of itself and its purpose. "Charizard, Milotic, Flygon, Spiritomb and Shedinja. I don't remember their names." He nodded enthusiastically, "How did you come up with a team that can beat the hell out of anyone who comes up against you?"

She recalled each of her companions by their names. Maybe he was one of her biggest fans but he would be hard pressed to outshine her mother. She offered him a bitter smile as way of acknowledgement. "Can I ask you something rather personal?"

"Fire away." Erin said as if he hadn't already invaded on her personal space and the silence that her presence commanded.

"I will never understand why you retired so early in your career Erin. You annihilated everyone who stood in your path and to prove you were the best you took your claim out of Kanto, out of Johto, out of Hoenn, out of Sinnoh, out of Unova and shoved it down the throat of every trainer in Orre. Carved your story and dominance into Mt. Battle and then returned to stand supreme over the Champion League and then just decided to stop. Why didn't you stay as champion?"

"Well they offered me the position of the Hoenn League Champion when I declined they offered me the position as one of the Elite Four. If I were a member of the Elite Four no one would make it past me and besides Ji'ji is the Dragon Master for the League, having two would be completely unfair for the competitors don't you think?"

"Unless they had an ice type with them." The purple haired man offered helpfully.

"In which case I would take Shannis to the air and bombard them with fire while staying completely out of harms reach using his superior agility to ensure that he isn't harmed." She came back calmly, this was something she was used to, they could talk strategy in battle all day. Talking about appeals and how to best wow the judges they would be here for a long time and not get anywhere.

"Your battling skills are fearsome, the amount of time that you must put into planning and training before each battle must be astronomical." Erin shook her head as a negative. "How many you must've gone through to get to where you are now…" the last was spoken more to himself than to her.

"I'll tell you what I told Ash Ketchum the day he lost his to me for the tenth time. Being a Champion means that you are what all the role model that young trainers base themselves off of, being a Champion means that you are the one that the world looks up to because you are strong and because you do what is right. I am not the image that ten year olds should strive to be."


End file.
